An Atheist Explores the Apocrypha Part 25: Your Greek Philosophy Is Showing (Ecclesiasticus 36-40)
Ecclesiasticus
36-40
Your Greek Philosophy Is Showing.
Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts
(Apocrypha version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Old
Testament Apocrypha, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as
literature and mythology.
Ecclesiasticus
36
“Smite in sunder the heads of the rulers of the heathen,
that say, There is none other but we”
Bit of an odd one, this chapter. It starts more like a
prayer, or a psalm, declaring “Have mercy
upon us, O Lord God of all, and behold us” and going on to say in many
words how great God is and asking Him to restore the tribes of Israel – “Gather all the tribes of Jacob together, and
inherit thou them, as from the beginning” and to raise of Jerusalem – “Fill Sion with thine unspeakable oracles,
and thy people with thy glory”.
So far, so typical, really. It’s a stirring
exhortation but also nothing that we haven’t seen in countless psalms.
Then, suddenly, the text switches to praise of wives
and marriage – “The beauty of a woman
cheereth the countenance, and a man loveth nothing better” (as long as she
doesn’t argue with you, of course…) and that “He that getteth a wife beginneth a possession, a help like unto
himself, and a pillar of rest”.
And then, even more strangely it talks of not trusting
homeless wanderers – “Who will trust a
thief well appointed, that skippeth from city to city? so who will believe a man that hath no house, and lodgeth
wheresoever the night taketh him?”
It’s kind of connected, because without a wife,
according to the text, a man may as well be without a home. And can we do a
Matthew Henry and try to shoehorn in an allegory? Without faith in God (the “wife”)
a man is adrift spiritually (“homeless”). Yeah, it’s easy this kind of thing.
Why the prayer abruptly changed to more advice, though, is harder to decipher.
Ecclesiasticus
37
“Beware
of a counsellor, and know before what need he hath; for he will counsel for
himself; lest he cast the lot upon thee”
Throughout Ecclesiasticus there’s a sense that, like
Ecclesiastes and Proverbs, this is written as guidelines specifically for a
ruler, and that’s continued here with verses that warn against taking counsel
from people with their own agendas.
To some extent, this is perfectly sensible, but in a
more pragmatic sense, well, everyone has their own desires, so rather than
saying “Neither consult with a woman
touching her of whom she is jealous; neither with a coward in matters of war;
nor with a merchant concerning exchange; nor with a buyer of selling; nor with
an envious man of thankfulness; nor with an unmerciful man touching kindness;
nor with the slothful for any work; nor with an hireling for a year of finishing
work; nor with an idle servant of much business”, perhaps its better to
recognise when somebody might have their own biases and to take their advice
with this in mind.
Rather like picking out the editorial bias from a news
source.
With that advice now imparted (and do we take it as
regards to Ben Sirach and wonder what his
bias is?), we return to more about the getting of Wisdom – “A wise man shall be filled with blessing;
and all they that see him shall count him happy”.
And then some random snippets. First, recognising that
different people have different tastes – “For
all things are not profitable for all men, neither hath every soul pleasure in
every thing”, secondly, the dangers of overeating – “For excess of meats bringeth sickness, and surfeiting will turn into
choler”, which one could take to be a warning against overindulgence in any
pleasure.
Ecclesiasticus
38
“Honour
a physician with the honour due unto him for the uses which ye may have of him:
for the Lord hath created him”
The skill of doctors is singled out here, because
their knowledge of medicine is granted by God in order to save lives, according
to Ben Sirach. He mentions some kind of medicine - “Was not the water made sweet with wood, that the virtue thereof might
be known?” which sounds to me like either quinine or willow bark, but could
be any kind of herbal remedy, really.
I do like how Ben Sirach recommends the listener to
continue to pray whilst sick, but also to let physicians and apothecaries treat
them, just to be on the safe side. You never know, after, all, if God is going
to work through the prayers or through the doctors (spoiler: it’ll be the
doctors).
Evidently Ben Sirach is considering what happens when
the God-given skill of the healers doesn’t work, because the next section
concerns how to mourn. Firstly, make a big fuss as is expected of you - “Weep bitterly, and make great moan, and use
lamentation, as he is worthy, and that a day or two, lest thou be evil spoken
of: and then comfort thyself for thy heaviness”. That is how the next part
of the verse phrases it – “lest thou be
evil spoken of” – but the intent also, I think, is not to be afraid to
grieve for the dead. But there is also time, in the end, to let go of grief and
turn it to remembrance - “When the dead
is at rest, let his remembrance rest; and be comforted for him, when his Spirit
is departed from him”. The
implication here is that the spirit of the deceased cannot truly be at rest if
the living are keeping it back with their excess grief. It’s quite a nuanced
section.
Finally we get to a section that reminds me of Plato’s
Republic. Firstly, it recognises that “The
wisdom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure: and he that hath
little business shall become wise”. Craftsmen cannot become wise through
book-learning because they are busy plying their trades, and Ben Sirach gives
some examples of craftsmen. His description of the smith is a tour-de-force; “The smith also sitting by the anvil, and
considering the iron work, the vapour of the fire wasteth his flesh, and he
fighteth with the heat of the furnace: the noise of the hammer and the anvil is
ever in his ears, and his eyes look still upon the pattern of the thing that he
maketh; he setteth his mind to finish his work, and watcheth to polish it
perfectly”.
Ben Sirach concludes that although the craftsmen
aren’t wise in the sense that grants them to ability to guide society,
nevertheless they are wise after the fashion of their craft and society would
not function without them: “They shall
not be sought for in publick counsel, nor sit high in the congregation: they
shall not sit on the judges' seat, nor understand the sentence of judgment:
they cannot declare justice and judgment; and they shall not be found where
parables are spoken. But they will maintain the state of the world, and all their desire is
in the work of their craft.”
In that fashion he reminds me of Plato’s ideal
society, with the differentiation between wise philosophical rulers, or
“Guardian” class and the producers, the craftsmen and farmers. Ecclesiasticus
is dated as written after the Republic; I wonder if some ideas permeated
across, or if this is a convergent concept arrived at individually. There are
also echoes of the likes of Aristotle differentiating between “practical
knowledge” (techne) vs “wisdom” (nous).
Ecclesiasticus
39
“But
he that giveth his mind to the law of the most High, and is occupied in the
meditation thereof, will seek out the wisdom of all the ancient, and be
occupied in prophecies.”
There’s a bit more about Ben Sirach’s wise ruler and
his attributes, including the use of propaganda - “subtil parables” – that again mimics Plato and his concern over the
use of theatre. Also, this ruler will “seek
out the secrets of grave sentences, and be conversant in dark parables”, a
nice gloomy combination of adjectives that imply that the ruler also needs to
look to dark places to learn wisdom.
Such a wise rule will achieve a form of immortality
through his legacy - “so long as the
world endureth, it shall not be blotted out; his memorial shall not depart
away, and his name shall live from generation to generation”. This
reinforces once again that prior to the New Testament, death was seen purely as
an end, there’s no sense of an immortal soul nor any kind of resurrection or
afterlife.
Ben Sirach, however, is “filled as the moon at the full” with the need to speak about God’s
greatness, and calling upon the readers to be like a lily or an incense burner
and to “send forth a smell”, he goes
into a poetic paeon to God, which is mostly simple praise like many of the
psalms, but does include a few verses worth mentioning.
“A man need not
to say, What is this? wherefore is that? for he hath made all things for their
uses,” says Ben Sirach, which seems to me to undermine some of his previous
sentiments about God granting mankind wisdom for the exact purpose of learning
more about God’s creation. And here he seems to be falling into the dull
rhetoric that “it just is, now stop asking questions”.
He also brushes aside the Problem of Evil by seemingly
suggesting that evil things were created by God for the purpose of punishing
evil people - “For the good are good
things created from the beginning: so evil things for sinners”. Which is
all well and good, but fails to answer the objection that sometimes evil things
happen to good people.
We also learn that “The principal things for the whole use of man's life are water, fire,
iron, and salt, flour of wheat, honey, milk, and the blood of the grape, and
oil, and clothing”. Which … yeah, I guess you could pretty much live on
that. I think the diet might affect your health eventually but it’d keep you
alive. I like the term “blood of the
grape” for, presumably, wine. Reminds me of “milk of the poppy” from Game
of Thrones.
Ben Sirach also promise “Teeth of wild beasts, and scorpions, serpents, and the sword punishing
the wicked to destruction”. His heart really isn’t into the whole fire and
brimstone thing, though. Compare him to Jeremiah, or Jude, or Zechariah, or
John the Seer and he’s very tame. I guess I’m used to all the drinks of boiling
pus and so on from the Qur’an as well.
Ecclesiasticus
40
“Great
travail is created for every man, and an heavy yoke is upon the sons of Adam,
from the day that they go out of their mother's womb, till the day that they
return to the mother of all things.”
It’s interesting to note the “mother of all things” in this passage; once again Ben Sirach seems
to be returning to a female principle as, if not an equal of God, certainly a
part of God.
This is a fascinating chapter, mainly concerned with
the fear of death. Not only will all things die, “From him that weareth purple and a crown, unto him that is clothed with
a linen frock”, but also it is the lot of humans to live in fear of death. Ben
Sirach seems to be saying here that the fear of death is similar to night
terrors, and “When all is safe, he
awaketh, and marvelleth that the fear was nothing”. There’s no attempt to
salve the fear of death by offering some kind of afterlife or immortal soul,
rather Ben Sirach talks along the lines of acceptance.
He goes on to compare the lives of the wicked and the
just, mainly from a legacy standpoint although it could be read as an apocalyptic
– “All bribery and injustice shall be
blotted out: but true dealing shall endure for ever”. There’s a nice set of
verses wherein good things in life are contrasted with better things, for
example “Wine and musick rejoice the
heart: but the love of wisdom is above them both” and “A friend and companion never meet amiss: but above both is a wife with
her husband”. Nothing here is singled out as being particularly bad. Gold
and silver, wine, friends, music, these are all good things, it’s just that
wisdom and good counsel and charity are better.
The last verses of this chapter then abruptly go about
not living as a beggar, and as such are a complete non-sequitor which I shall
henceforth ignore.
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