Sibylline Oracles

Historical printed page 379

7 THE SIBYLLINE BOOKS. Boox III, Lines 1-62 (8) Ye men that bear the form that God did mould in his image, (9) why do ye wander at random and walk not in the straight path, (10) being ever mindful of the eternal Creator? (11) There is one sovereign God, ineffable, whose dwelling is in heaven, (12) self sprung, unseen yet seeing all himself alone. (13) No mason’s hand did make him, nor does some model formed from gold (14) or ivory by the varied skill of man represent him. (15) But he, himself Eternal, hath revealed himself (16) as One who is and was before, yea and shall be hereafter. (17) For who, being mortal, can gaze on God with hiseyes? (18) Or who could bear even to hear the mere name (19) of the mighty, heavenly God, the World-Ruler? (20) Who by his word created all, both heaven and sea (21) and tireless sun and moon at full (22) and twinkling stars, mighty mother Ocean, (23) springs and rivers, fire immortal, days and nights. (24) Yea it is God Himself who fashioned four-lettered Adam, (25) the first man fashioned, who completes in his name (26) morn and dusk, antarctic and arctic. (27) He too both established the fashion of the form of mortal men (28) and made the beasts and things that creep and fly. (29) Ye do not worship nor fear God, but wander at haphazard, (30) bowing down to serpents and doing sacrifice to cats, (31) and to dumb idols and stone statues of mortal wights, (32) and sitting down before the doors of godless temples (33) ye weary the God who ever is, who guards all (34), taking your delight in miserable stones, forgetting the judgement (35) of the Eternal Saviour Who created heaven and earth. (36) O race that delights in blood, crafty, wicked race of godless men, (37) liars and double-tongued, immoral, (38) adulterous, idolatrous, of wily devices, (39) within whose heart is evil, a frenzied spur, (40) snatching for yourselves, having a shameless mind! (41) For no man of wealth endowed with goods will give any part to another, (42) but miserable meanness shall be among all mortals, (43) and faith they shall never keep at all, (44) but many widowed women shall have other secret lovers for lucre’s sake, (45) and gaining husbands shall not keep hold of the rope of life. (46) But when Rome shall rule over Egypt as well, (47) tas she still hesitates to do,} then the mightiest kingdom (48) of the immortal king over men shall appear. (49) And a holy prince shall come to wield the sceptre over all the world (50) unto all ages of hurrying time. (51) And then there shall be inexorable wrath on Latin men. (52) Three with piteous fate shall bring ruin on Rome, (53) and all its people shall perish in their own dwellings, (54) whensoever a cataract of fire shall flow from heaven. (55) O wretched me! when shall that day arrive, (56) even the judgement of the eternal God, the mighty King? (57) Yet for the present be ye founded, O ye cities, and adorned all of you (58) with temples and race-courses, with markets and statues (59) of gold and silver and stone, that ye may come to the day of bitterness. (60) For come it will, whenever the odour of brimstone pervades (61) all mankind. But I will tell out in particular (62) all those cities in which men are to suffer woe. 8-45. Praise of God and denunciation of idolatry. The passage is similar to Fr. i. and iii. Cf. also Isa. xl. 18 ff.; Wisdom of Solomon xiii. το ff. 12. seeing ... alone. There is no need to alter ὁρῶν μόνος (φ, Ψ) into ὁρώμενος. For the thought cf. Ori, Frag. iv. 9 f. οὐδέ τις αὐτὸν εἰσοράει θνητῶν αὐτὸς δέ τε πάντας ὁρᾶται. 14. by the varied skill. τέχνῃσ᾽ is a conjecture of Wilamowitz. It is possible to translate the MSS. τεχνῆς, ‘no model of the art of man. . .᾿ 17. Cf. Exod. xxxiii. 20; Judg. xiii. 22, &c. 20. For God’s word as the agent of Creation cf. Ps. xxxiii. 6. It is not yet personified as in Philo. 24. The letters of Adam are represented as giving the initials of East, West, South, and North. In 2 En. xxx. 13 an acrostic is formed on this name. The same idea recurs in an anonymous writing, De Montibus Sina et Sion 4, and in Aug. 7ract. in Joh. Evang. ix. 14. 25. in his name. For καὶ οὔνομα it is necessary to read kar’ οὔνομα. 30. The objects of worship are specially Egyptian. Cf. Frag. iii. 27. 31. dumb. ἀλάλοις. So Alexandre emends from ἄλλοις. 33. ye weary. The MSS. reading τηρεῖτε can hardly be translated. Read reiper’ dei. Cf. Isa. xliii. 24. 34. forgetting. ἐκλαθέοντες does not occur elsewhere in the active with this meaning. Mein. suggests ἐκλελαθόντες, but this is usually causative in meaning. 37. The restoration of the text is due to Castalio. 40. for yourselves. For αὐτοῖς it seems necessary to read αὑτοῖς. 42. meanness, xaxin in the special sense of stinginess. Cf. Rom, i. 29. 44-5. In 1 Tim. v. 11, 12 regularly constituted church widows are forbidden to marry again. Here the objection seems to be against second marriages in general. 45. rope of life. This is probably a nautical metaphor. 4 46-62. The reign of the Holy King and the destruction of the wicked. For the question of the date see Intro- uction, p. 371. 46. A Rabbinic guess as to the time of the coming of the Messiah was nine months after the empire of Rome had extended over the whole world. Cf. Edersheim, 12,5 and Times, i. 169 (with notes). 47. tas she still hesitates to dot. The text is uncertain, and various emendations are possible. In Geffcken’s text εἰσέτι (for MSS. εἰς ἐν) δηθύνουσα "τότε δὴ" it seems necessary to omit δή. Buresch and Fehr suggest eis ἐν δ᾽ ἰθύνει. 49. aholy prince. He must be the Messiah, and not as Alexandre suggests, Vespasian. 54. Possibly a reference to the burning of the Capitoline Juppiter in 84 B.C., in which the Sibylline Books perished, or to the destruction by lightning of the statue of Juppiter on the Alban Mount in 57 B.C. 60. For brimstone as a feature of the Judgement cf. infr. 462 ; 1 Enoch cxvii. 6. 379