King James Version · Under the Greeks
Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 9
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1Be not over the wife of thy , and teach her not an evil lesson against thyself. 2Give not thy unto a woman to set her foot upon thy substance. 3Meet not with an , lest thou fall into her snares. 4Use not much the company of a woman that is a singer, lest thou be taken with her attempts. 5Gaze not on a maid, that thou fall not by those things that are precious in her. 6Give not thy unto harlots, that thou lose not thine . 7Look not round about thee in the streets of the city, neither wander thou in the solitary place thereof. 8Turn away thine eye from a beautiful woman, and look not upon another’s beauty; for many have been deceived by the beauty of a woman; for herewith love is kindled as a . 9Sit not at all with another man’s wife, nor sit down with her in thine arms, and spend not thy money with her at the ; lest thine incline unto her, and so through thy thou fall into . 10Forsake not an old friend; for the new is not comparable to him: a new friend is as ; when it is old, thou shalt drink it with pleasure. 11Envy not the of a : for thou knowest not what shall be his end. 12Delight not in the thing that the ungodly have pleasure in; but remember they shall not go unpunished unto their . 13Keep thee far from the man that hath to kill; so shalt thou not doubt the fear of : and if thou come unto him, make no fault, lest he take away thy life presently: remember that thou goest in the midst of snares, and that thou walkest upon the battlements of the city. 14As near as thou canst, guess at thy neighbour, and consult with . 15Let thy talk be with , and all thy communication in of . 16And let men eat and drink with thee; and let thy glorying be in the . 17For the hand of the artificer the work shall be commended: and ruler of the people for his speech. 18A man of an ill is dangerous in his city; and he that is rash in his talk shall be hated.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under the Greeks, 332 BC to 63 BC ›
Alexander's conquest and the kingdoms of his successors. Greek language and custom press in everywhere, and the crisis under Antiochus IV provokes the Maccabean revolt.
- The successors
- Alexander dies at thirty-two and his generals carve up the empire. Judea sits on the border between the Ptolemies in Egypt and the Seleucids in Syria, and is fought over by both for a century and a half, which is the ordinary condition of the corridor.
- Hellenism
- Not just conquest but a culture: the gymnasium, the theatre, Greek names, Greek dress, Greek as the language of anyone with ambitions. Some Jews embraced it, some resisted it, and the argument between them is the real subject of the Maccabean books. In Alexandria the Hebrew scriptures are translated into Greek, producing the Septuagint, which is the Bible most New Testament writers quote.
- The crisis
- Antiochus IV bans the practice of Judaism, plunders the temple, and sets up a pagan altar in it in 167 BC. The revolt under the Maccabees wins, the temple is rededicated in 164 BC, which is the origin of Hanukkah, and Judea has about eighty years of independence under the Hasmoneans before Rome arrives.
- Further afield
- Rome fights Carthage three times and ends up master of the Mediterranean. Euclid writes the Elements and Archimedes does his work at Syracuse. In China the Qin unify the country in 221 BC and the Han follow, opening what becomes the Silk Road.
All of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus)