HOLY BIBLE: Ecclesiastes 5 (original) (raw)

12 ἔστιν ἀρρωστία ἣν εἶδον ὑπὸ τὸν ἥλιον πλοῦτον φυλασσόμενον τῷ πα{R'} αὐτοῦ εἰς κακίαν αὐτοῦ 13 καὶ ἀπολεῖται ὁ πλοῦτος ἐκεῖνος ἐν περισπασμῷ πονηρῷ καὶ ἐγέννησεν υἱόν καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν χειρὶ αὐτοῦ οὐδέν 14 καθὼς ἐξῆλθεν ἀπὸ γαστρὸς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ γυμνός ἐπιστρέψει τοῦ πορευθῆναι ὡς ἥκει καὶ οὐδὲν οὐ λήμψεται ἐν μόχθῳ αὐτοῦ ἵνα πορευθῇ ἐν χειρὶ αὐτοῦ 15 καί γε τοῦτο πονηρὰ ἀρρωστία ὥσπερ γὰρ παρεγένετο οὕτως καὶ ἀπελεύσεται καὶ τίς περισσεία αὐτῷ ᾗ μοχθεῖ εἰς ἄνεμον 16 καί γε πᾶσαι αἱ ἡμέραι αὐτοῦ ἐν σκότει καὶ πένθει καὶ θυμῷ πολλῷ καὶ ἀρρωστίᾳ καὶ χόλῳ 17 ἰδοὺ ὃ εἶδον ἐγὼ ἀγαθόν ὅ ἐστιν καλόν τοῦ φαγεῖν καὶ τοῦ πιεῖν καὶ τοῦ ἰδεῖν ἀγαθωσύνην ἐν παντὶ μόχθῳ αὐτοῦ ᾧ ἐὰν μοχθῇ ὑπὸ τὸν ἥλιον ἀριθμὸν ἡμερῶν ζωῆς αὐτοῦ ὧν ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ θεός ὅτι αὐτὸ μερὶς αὐτοῦ 18 καί γε πᾶς ὁ ἄνθρωπος ᾧ ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ θεὸς πλοῦτον καὶ ὑπάρχοντα καὶ ἐξουσίασεν αὐτὸν τοῦ φαγεῖν ἀ{P'} αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῦ λαβεῖν τὸ μέρος αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῦ εὐφρανθῆναι ἐν μόχθῳ αὐτοῦ τοῦτο δόμα θεοῦ ἐστιν 19 ὅτι οὐ πολλὰ μνησθήσεται τὰς ἡμέρας τῆς ζωῆς αὐτοῦ ὅτι ὁ θεὸς περισπᾷ αὐτὸν ἐν εὐφροσύνῃ καρδίας αὐτοῦ

12 Another evil I have found past remedy, here under the sun; riches that a man hoards to his own undoing. 13 By cruel misadventure they are lost to him, and to the son he has begotten nothing he leaves but poverty. 14 Naked he came, when he left his mother’s womb, and naked still death finds him; nothing to show for all his long endeavour. 15 Alas, what ailed him, that he should go away no richer than he came? Nothing left of all those wasted labours of his; 16 all his life long the cheerless board, the multitudinous cares, the concern, the melancholy! 17 Better far, by my way of it, that a man should eat and drink and enjoy the revenues of his own labour, here under the sun, as long as God gives him life; what more can he claim? 18 God’s gift it is, if a man has wealth and goods and freedom to enjoy them, taking what comes to him and profiting by what he has earned. 19 Few be his days or many, he regards little, so long as God gives his heart content.

12

Est et alia infirmitas pessima quam vidi sub sole:
divitiæ conservatæ in malum domini sui.

13
Pereunt enim in afflictione pessima:
generavit filium qui in summa egestate erit. 14
Sicut egressus est nudus de utero matris suæ, sic revertetur,
et nihil auferet secum de labore suo. 15
Miserabilis prorsus infirmitas:
quomodo venit, sic revertetur.
Quid ergo prodest ei quod laboravit in ventum? 16
cunctis diebus vitæ suæ comedit in tenebris,
et in curis multis, et in ærumna atque tristitia. 17

Hoc itaque visum est mihi bonum,
ut comedat quis et bibat,
et fruatur lætitia ex labore suo
quo laboravit ipse sub sole,
numero dierum vitæ suæ
quos dedit ei Deus;
et hæc est pars illius.

18
Et omni homini cui dedit Deus divitias atque substantiam,
potestatemque ei tribuit ut comedat ex eis,
et fruatur parte sua, et lætetur de labore suo:
hoc est donum Dei. 19
Non enim satis recordabitur dierum vitæ suæ,
eo quod Deus occupet deliciis cor ejus.

[1] v. 5: ‘No thought I gave to it’; literally, ‘There is no foresight’. A comparison with the Hebrew text makes it clear that there is no question of denying God’s Providence.

[2] vv. 1-6: It is perhaps best to understand the whole of this passage as referring to rash vows. In that case, the words in verse 1, literally, ‘God is in heaven, and thou art on earth’, will not be a mere assertion of the divine dignity, but a reminder that God knows, better than we ourselves, what is best for us.

[3] There can be little doubt that the old Douay translators were right in interpreting the Latin as a reference to divine, not to earthly kingship. The meaning of the Hebrew text is quite uncertain.

[4] In the original, this verse begins simply, ‘The covetous man will never have his fill of money’; the rendering given above assumes that there is a tacit connexion between this verse and what went before.

Knox Translation Copyright © 2013 Westminster Diocese
Nihil Obstat. Father Anton Cowan, Censor.
Imprimatur. +Most Rev. Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. 8th January 2012.
Re-typeset and published in 2012 by Baronius Press Ltd