Texts in Conversation
In the Greek version of Isaiah 29, God condemns praise from lips but not the heart. The author of 1 Clement quotes only this contrast. The preacher in 2 Clement repeats that form to stress obedience, perhaps using a common interpretation of Isaiah.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
LXX Isaiah 29:13
Septuagint
11 And all these sayings shall become for you like the words of this sealed book. If they give it to a learned man, saying, “Read these things,” then he will say, “I cannot read it, for it is sealed.” 12 And this book will be given into the hands of an unlearned man, and one will say to him, “Read this,” and he will say, “I am not learned.” 13 The Lord said: These people draw near me; they honor me with their lips, while their heart is far from me, and in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts and teachings. 14 Therefore look, I will proceed to remove this people. I will remove them and destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will hide.
Clement of Rome, 1 Clement 15:2
First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians
Early Christian
1 Therefore let us be loyal to those that practice peace with godliness, and not to those that desire peace with dissimulation. 2 For He says in a certain place “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.” 3 and again, “they blessed with their mouth, but they cursed with their heart.” 4 And again He says, “They loved Him with their mouth, and with their tongue they lied to Him; and their heart was not upright with Him, neither were they steadfast in His covenant.” 5 For this cause “let the deceitful lips be made dumb which speak iniquity against the righteous.” And again “May the Lord utterly destroy all the deceitful lips, the tongue that speaks proud things, even those that say, ‘Let us magnify our tongue; our lips are our own; who is lord over us.’”
2 Clement 3:5
Early Christian
1 Seeing then that He bestowed such great mercy on us; first of all, that we, who are living, do not sacrifice to these dead gods or worship them, but through Him have known the Father of truth. What else is this knowledge of Him but not to deny Him through whom we have known the Father? 2 Yes, He Himself says, “Whoever confesses Me, him will I confess before the Father.” 3 This then is our reward, if truly we shall confess Him through whom we were saved. 4 But how do we confess Him? When we do what He says and are not disobedient to His commandments, and do not merely honor Him with our lips, but with our whole heart and our whole mind. 5 Now He says also in Isaiah, “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.”
Date: 130-160 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... The text of 2 Clement here shares some features with Matthew’s/Mark’s citation of Isa. 29. 13 over against the LXX version of Isa. 29. 13 itself: e.g., in omitting the reference to ‘drawing near’ [...]. However, equally noteworthy is the existence of another citation of the same text in 1 Clem. 15. 1, which agrees with the version in 2 Clement almost verbatim [...]. It would appear then that 2 Clement attests a version of the verse which was also known to the author of 1 Clement and which in turn was independent of the synoptic evangelists. Further, 2 Clement (unlike 1 Clement) explicitly cites this as a verse from Isaiah, not a saying of ‘the Lord’ or of a Christian gospel text. It thus seems most likely that, although a slight influence from the text of Matthew/Mark might be implied, the primary source for ‘Clement’s’ citation here is the book of Isaiah itself, perhaps in a Greek version differing slightly from the LXX version. ...”
Gregory, Andrew F.
The Reception of the New Testament in the Apostolic Fathers
(p. 273) Oxford University Press, 2005
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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