Ecclesiasticus 42

Do not be ashamed of the things listed here, and do not show favor to anyone in a way that leads you into sin.

1Of these things be not thou ashamed, and accept no person to sin thereby:

NoteVerses 1 to 8 are one running list, and it continues a catalog begun in the previous chapter, where the writer set out the things a person ought to be ashamed of. Here he turns the list over: these are the things no one should feel shame about. "Accept no person" is old English for showing partiality, treating someone differently because of who they are rather than by what is right; the warning is against bending a rule or a verdict to spare someone's feelings, or your own.

2Do not be ashamed of the law of the Most High and of his covenant, his binding agreement, or of giving a judgment that deals justly with a person who does not honor God.

2Of the law of the most High, and his covenant; and of judgment to justify the ungodly;

NoteA covenant is a formal, binding agreement carrying obligations on both sides, and it was the standard term for the relationship between God and Israel. The second clause is genuinely unclear in the Greek: "judgment to justify the ungodly" can mean delivering an honest verdict even when it clears a person who does not honor God, or simply passing a fair sentence on such a person. "Justify" in 1611 English means to declare in the right, to acquit.

3Do not be ashamed of settling accounts with your business partners and with fellow travelers, or of a gift given out of what friends have inherited.

3Of reckoning with thy partners and travellers; or of the gift of the heritage of friends;

Note"Reckoning" is settling accounts, working out who owes what to whom. The partners are joint investors in a trading venture; the travelers are companions who shared the costs and the risks of a journey by caravan. Both arrangements ended in an itemized settlement, and the advice is not to be embarrassed about demanding one. The "gift of the heritage of friends" is a share handed out of property that friends have inherited.

4Do not be ashamed of being exact with the balance and the weights, or of gaining much or gaining little.

4Of exactness of balance and weights; or of getting much or little;

NoteA balance was a beam with a pan hanging at each end, the goods in one pan weighed against stone or metal weights the trader carried in a pouch. Shaved, swapped or mismatched weights were the standard fraud of the ancient market, so insisting on exact ones was a real protection, even if checking them in front of a seller looked small-minded.

5Do not be ashamed of haggling over a price with merchants, or of correcting your children often, or of making the side of a wicked slave bleed.

5And of merchants’ indifferent selling; of much correction of children; and to make the side of an evil servant to bleed.

Note"Indifferent" here does not mean uncaring. It stands for a Greek word meaning difference or profit in a price, so the phrase is about bargaining with merchants over what something will sell for. "Servant" in the King James regularly means slave: a household slave was legally property, and beating one was ordinary and lawful in the world this advice assumes.

6Where there is a bad wife, a seal is a good thing. Where many hands come and go, lock things up.

6Sure keeping is good, where an evil wife is; and shut up, where many hands are.

NoteA seal was a lump of clay or wax pressed with a signet ring or an engraved stone and set across a door, a jar, a chest or the mouth of a bag, so that nothing could be opened without visibly breaking it. It was less a lock than a tamper-proof mark: it did not stop a thief, it proved a theft.

7Whatever you hand over, hand it over by count and by weight. Put everything in writing, both what you give out and what you take in.

7Deliver all things in number and weight; and put all in writing that thou givest out, or receivest in.

NoteSilver and goods alike changed hands by count or by weight rather than on trust, and a written memorandum was the only record either party had of a transaction. The advice is the standard practice of a steward answerable for someone else's property.

8Do not be ashamed to teach the person who has no sense and the fool, or a very old man who argues with the young. In this way you will be truly well taught, and approved by everyone alive.

8Be not ashamed to inform the unwise and foolish, and the extreme aged that contendeth with those that are young: thus shalt thou be truly learned, and approved of all men living.

NoteThe middle clause is compressed and can be read two ways: teach the very old man who quarrels with the young, or correct him for quarreling. "Truly learned" means properly taught rather than scholarly, and "approved of all men living" means well regarded by everyone alive.

9A daughter keeps her father awake in secret, and worrying about her takes his sleep away: while she is young, in case she goes past the flower of her age; and when she is married, in case she is hated.

9The father waketh for the daughter, when no man knoweth; and the care for her taketh away sleep: when she is young, lest she pass away the flower of her age; and being married, lest she should be hated:

Note"Pass away the flower of her age" means pass the years in which she could still be married. Girls were normally betrothed in their early teens, and an unmarried daughter remained her father's legal and financial responsibility for as long as she stayed unmarried. "Hated" is legal language of the period for a wife rejected by her husband, the situation that ended in divorce, not simply a feeling about her.

10While she is a virgin, in case she is violated and becomes pregnant in her father's house; when she has a husband, in case she does wrong; and when she is married, in case she has no children.

10In her virginity, lest she should be defiled and gotten with child in her father’s house; and having an husband, lest she should misbehave herself; and when she is married, lest she should be barren.

NoteAn unmarried daughter's pregnancy fell on her father: he was her legal guardian, the marriage settlement agreed for her assumed her virginity, and the family's standing in the town went with it. "Misbehave herself" is a mild rendering of a word for a married woman's adultery, which the law treated as a capital matter. A marriage that produced no children could end with the wife sent back to her father's house.

11Keep a strict watch over a daughter who has no shame, or she will make you a laughingstock to your enemies, a byword in the city and a name people speak of with scorn, and she will shame you in front of the crowd.

11Keep a sure watch over a shameless daughter, lest she make thee a laughingstock to thine enemies, and a byword in the city, and a reproach among the people, and make thee ashamed before the multitude.

NoteA "byword" is a name that has turned into a stock example, the phrase people reach for when they want to name a disgrace. The word behind "shameless" carries the sense of headstrong or stubborn as much as immodest. The shame described is public and local: in a walled town everyone knew whose daughter she was.

12Do not stare at every beautiful body, and do not sit in the middle of a group of women.

12Behold not every body’s beauty, and sit not in the midst of women.

NoteThe King James prints "every body's beauty" as two words, meaning any person's beauty; it is not "everybody's". The second half assumes a household or a gathering in which the women sat apart from male guests, so that taking a seat among them crossed a recognized line.

13For out of clothes comes a moth, and out of a woman comes a woman's wickedness.

13For from garments cometh a moth, and from women wickedness.

NoteThe proverb turns on the fact that a clothes moth is bred in the very cloth it eats away: the ruin comes out of the thing itself. The Greek of the second line repeats its noun in the same pattern, literally "from a woman comes a woman's wickedness".

14A man's wickedness is better than a woman who does good, a woman, I mean, who brings shame and disgrace.

14Better is the churlishness of a man than a courteous woman, a woman, I say, which bringeth shame and reproach.

Note"Churlishness" in 1611 English meant rough, surly, ungracious behavior; the Greek word behind it is the ordinary word for wickedness. The line is framed as a proverb about public honor and disgrace, and its second half narrows the comparison by specifying which kind of woman is meant.

15I will now call to mind the works of the Lord, and I will tell what I have seen. The works of the Lord are in his words.

15I will now remember the works of the Lord, and declare the things that I have seen: In the words of the Lord are his works.

NoteThe catalog of shame ends here. This line opens a long poem in praise of God's works that runs through the end of chapter 43. "In the words of the Lord are his works" points to making by command: what exists came to be at his word.

16The sun that gives light looks down on all things, and the work of the Lord is full of his glory.

16The sun that giveth light looketh upon all things, and the work thereof is full of the glory of the Lord.

17The Lord has not given his holy ones the power to tell all his marvelous works, which the Almighty Lord firmly settled, so that everything that exists might stand firm for his glory.

17The Lord hath not given power to the saints to declare all his marvellous works, which the Almighty Lord firmly settled, that whatsoever is might be established for his glory.

Note"Saints" here does not mean holy people. It renders a word meaning holy ones, the angels or heavenly beings of God's court; even they, standing closest to him, are not given the power to give a full account of what he has made.

18He searches out the deep and the heart, and he understands their hidden plans. For the Lord knows everything that can be known, and he sees the signs of the world.

18He seeketh out the deep, and the heart, and considereth their crafty devices: for the Lord knoweth all that may be known, and he beholdeth the signs of the world.

Note"The deep" is the abyss, the mass of water thought to lie beneath the earth and past the edges of the known world, the least reachable place there is; the heart was understood as the seat of thought and intention. The pair means the farthest place outside a person and the farthest place inside one. "The signs of the world" translates a phrase that can equally mean the signs of the age, the marks by which the course of time may be read.

19He tells what is past and what is still to come, and he uncovers the traces of hidden things.

19He declareth the things that are past, and for to come, and revealeth the steps of hidden things.

Note"Steps" translates a word for tracks or traces, the footprints a thing leaves behind it. The claim is not only that God knows hidden things but that he uncovers the trail they left.

20No thought escapes him, and no word is hidden from him.

20No thought escapeth him, neither any word is hidden from him.

21He has set in order the great works of his wisdom, and he is from everlasting to everlasting. Nothing can be added to him and nothing can be taken away from him, and he has no need of any adviser.

21He hath garnished the excellent works of his wisdom, and he is from everlasting to everlasting: unto him may nothing be added, neither can he be diminished, and he hath no need of any counsellor.

Note"Garnished" in 1611 English means arranged or set in order, not decorated. The Greek of the following clause is ambiguous about what can have nothing added to it: it may be God himself, or the works of his wisdom just named, which stand complete as they are.

22How desirable all his works are! And a person can see this even in a spark.

22Oh how desirable are all his works! and that a man may see even to a spark.

NoteThe last clause is obscure in the Greek and has been read in more than one way: that everything God made is worth looking at, down to a single spark; or that even a spark gives light enough to see his works by. The King James preserves the oddity rather than smoothing it out.

23All these things live and last forever, for every kind of use, and they are all obedient.

23All these things live and remain for ever for all uses, and they are all obedient.

Note"These things" are the created works described in the preceding lines. "Obedient" means they keep to the work assigned them, doing what they were made to do without failing.

24All things come in pairs, one matched against the other, and he has made nothing incomplete.

24All things are double one against another: and he hath made nothing imperfect.

NoteThe idea that creation is built in matched pairs, each thing set facing its opposite, appears elsewhere in this book: good and evil, life and death, light and darkness. "Nothing imperfect" means nothing left unfinished or half made; everything has its counterpart.

25Each one confirms the good qualities of the other. And who could ever have his fill of looking at the glory of the Lord?

25One thing establisheth the good or another: and who shall be filled with beholding his glory?

NoteMost printings of the King James read "the good of another" here, and "or" is a slip of the press. The sense is that each member of a pair brings out and confirms what is good in the other.