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Sirach: A Compendium of a Lifetime of Scripture Study
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Readings for Daily Masses in Weeks 7 - 8 of Ordinary Time, Year I
Statue of Jesus ben Sira - Chartres Cathedral, France
Sirach is the only Old Testament book for which the author is known, for certain. In 50:27, the writer reveals that he is Jeshua, son of Eleazar, son of Sira. Therefore, we usually call the author “ben Sira.” Ben Sira was a Jewish scholar and scribe living in Jerusalem, and he may have spent his life instructing the children of the elite in the Jewish Law (Hebrew: Torah). Since this book was used so prominently in early Church teaching, the book was often called Ecclesiasticus, “The Church Book.” (This title is not to be confused with Ecclesiastes, another Old Testament book whose title refers to its author possibly being a liturgical leader.)
We are also confident that Sirach was completed within a 25-year window at the beginning of the 2nd century BC. In chapter 50, ben Sira speaks of the high priest Simon II (d. 196 BC) in the past tense while praying that Simon’s priestly line (ended in 171 BC) continues. Because of the time it was written, Sirach is a deuterocanonical book only included in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles. While Jewish scholars of the 1st century AD often referred to Sirach in their writings, the book is not included in the Jewish or Protestant canons.
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Context & Purpose
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Ben Sira wrote at a time of upheaval in Jerusalem and the surrounding region. The area had been ruled by the Ptolemeic Dynasty since 322 BC. Even though the Ptolemeic rulers were Hellenized Egyptians, they allowed residents of Jerusalem to maintain their Jewish culture and worship. After the Ptolemies were defeated by the Seleucid dynasty at the Battle of Panion in 200 BC, the Seleucids imposed a much harsher rule, trying to stamp out the Jewish religion. This would eventually lead to the Maccabean Revolt of 167 - 164 BC that established the short-lived Jewish Hasmonean Kingdom. (To learn more about this history, please refer to our page on Wisdom, Maccabees, and Daniel.)
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The Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple - Raphael
As someone who had dedicated himself to Jewish culture and law, ben Sira wanted to preserve the best of Judaism even while facing the reality of Greek Seleucid rule. He assembled this book as the culmination of a lifetime studying the Jewish Law, combining it with the best of Greek and Egyptian learning of his time.
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Genre & Content
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Mural in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem, depicting activity on the Cardo
(main street) before the city's destruction in 70 AD.
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Sirach is considered one of the wisdom books of the Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, taking its place alongside Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Psalms, Song of Songs, and Wisdom. Sirach is most similar to the Book of Proverbs. Both are collections of writings on a wide variety of topics regarding ethical behavior, cultural norms, and religious practices. Both include collections of short, pithy sayings, often engaging in wordplay that does not translate well into other languages.
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Sirach is a more sophisticated work than Proverbs in several ways:
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Variety. Sirach includes reflections, hymns, prayers, statements of beatitude and woe, and poems.
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Organization. While the unrelated couplets of Proverbs are often organized by acrostics or numerological principles, ben Sira groups his ideas by topic.
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Length. Sirach is one of the longest books of the Bible, longer than all except Jeremiah, Genesis, Psalms, and Ezekiel.
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Reward and punishment. While the author(s) of Proverbs sees the world exclusively through the lens of retributive justice (i.e., God rewards the good and punishes the wicked), ben Sira wrestles with the reality that sometimes the righteous will suffer (2:1 - 18) and the evil will receive good fortune (40:1 - 10).
Sirach covers a diversity of topics, both sacred and nominally secular, all concerning the importance of staying in right relationship with God and neighbor. Ben Sira speaks eloquently of the obligations and benefits of studying God’s Wisdom, living a virtuous life with self-control, caring for the poor, using wealth productively, nurturing familial and societal relationships, and promoting justice. He writes of the greatness of God and the sweep of salvation history. Perhaps the best known passage is from chapter 3, often used on the Feast of the Holy Family, which includes “kindness to a father will not be forgotten.”
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Difficulties with Sirach
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Some portions of Sirach are noticeably mysogynistic. Coming from a strictly patriarchal culture, ben Sira cautions his male readership on the apparent dangers of keeping the companionship of certain types of women. He speaks at length about the “shame” daughters can bring to family by either bearing children before marriage or remaining childless after marriage, concluding “better… a frightened daughter than any disgrace” (42:14). While the Church has not directly repudiated these portions of Sirach, they are not included in its liturgies.
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Jesus ben Sira - Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld
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Like many of the wisdom books in the Bible, Sirach has no overarching narrative, making it difficult to read straight through. There is no consensus on if or how Sirach can be divided into distinct sections, except for the “Praise of the Ancestors” hymn, 44:1 – 50:24. Portions of this hymn are used on the Friday of Week 4 in Ordinary Time, Year II (as a summary of King David’s accomplishments) and the Thursday of Week 11 in Ordinary Time, Year I (as a summary of the accomplishments of Elijah and Elisha).
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Which Version to Use? It's Greek to Us!
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Finding the most definitive version of Sirach has been challenging for biblical archaeologists, since variant versions in four languages have been found over the centuries. Ben Sira wrote in Hebrew, but the version most widely used in the Judeo-Christian world to this day is the Greek translation by ben Sira’s grandson. (This is explained in the introduction to the book, written by the grandson, probably around the year 117 BC.) Ben Sira’s grandson acknowledges that there is “no small difference” between the Greek translation and the original Hebrew.
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Until relatively recently, most of the known Hebrew manuscripts of Sirach dated from the Middle Ages. Older versions in Latin (early 3rd century AD, translated from the Greek) and in Syriac (4th century AD, translated from the original Hebrew) have also been promulgated for centuries. Portions of the original 2nd-century BC Hebrew were found in the caves of Qumran (the Dead Sea Scrolls) in the late 1940s. Because of the diverse translations, the Catholic Church has not approved a definitive version of Sirach, while holding that the book itself is divinely inspired and part of the biblical canon.
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The response to the first reading during these weeks is always from the Book of Psalms. The gospel reading is taken from the Gospel of Mark, chapters 9 - 11.
This concludes page 13 of 40 in our Lectionary Guide. For a comprehensive reading of the entire guide, we suggest going next to Wisdom, Maccabees, and Daniel.
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