King James Version · Under the Greeks
Wisdom of Solomon 17
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1For great are thy judgments, and cannot be expressed: therefore unnurtured have erred. 2For when unrighteous men thought to oppress the nation; they being shut up in their houses, the prisoners of , and fettered with the bonds of a long night, lay there exiled from the providence. 3For while they supposed to lie hid in their secret , they were scattered under a dark of forgetfulness, being horribly astonished, and troubled with strange apparitions. 4For neither might the corner that held them keep them from fear: but noises as of waters falling down sounded about them, and sad appeared unto them with heavy countenances. 5No of the might give them : neither could the bright flames of the stars to lighten that horrible night. 6Only there appeared unto them a kindled of itself, very dreadful: for being much terrified, they thought the things which they saw to be worse than the sight they saw not. 7As for the illusions of art magick, they were put down, and their vaunting in was reproved with . 8For they, that promised to drive away terrors and troubles from a sick , were sick themselves of fear, worthy to be laughed at. 9For though no terrible thing did fear them; yet being scared with that passed by, and hissing of , 10They for fear, denying that they saw the air, which could of no side be avoided. 11For wickedness, condemned by her own , is very timorous, and being pressed with , always forecasteth grievous things. 12For fear is nothing else but a betraying of the succours which reason offereth. 13And the from within, being less, counteth the ignorance more than the cause which bringeth the torment. 14But they sleeping the same sleep that night, which was indeed intolerable, and which came upon them out of the bottoms of inevitable hell, 15Were partly vexed with monstrous apparitions, and partly fainted, their failing them: for a sudden fear, and not looked for, came upon them. 16So then whosoever there fell down was straitly kept, shut up in a prison without iron bars, 17For whether he were husbandman, or , or a labourer in the field, he was overtaken, and that necessity, which could not be avoided: for they were all bound with one chain of . 18Whether it were a whistling wind, or a melodious noise of birds among the spreading , or a pleasing fall of water running violently, 19Or a terrible sound of stones cast down, or a running that could not be seen of skipping , or a roaring voice of most savage wild , or a rebounding echo from the hollow mountains; these things made them to swoon for fear. 20For the whole world shined with clear , and none were hindered in their labour: 21Over them only was spread an heavy night, an of that which should afterward receive them: but yet were they unto themselves more grievous than .
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.