Miscellanies 2.18.78 · Sophia Scriptura

Summary: The virtues recorded by Moses gave the Greeks the beginning of ethics; the law teaches godliness, justice, and prudence by forbidding idols and binding us to the Maker and Father.

Greek text · Stählin 2:153–154

Προφανεῖς μὲν οὖν καὶ πᾶσαι αἱ ἄλλαι ἀρεταί, αἱ παρὰ τῷ Μωυσεῖ ἀναγεγραμμέναι, ἀρχὴν Ἕλλησι παντὸς τοῦ ἠθικοῦ τόπου παρασχόμεναι, ἀνδρείαν λέγω καὶ σωφροσύνην καὶ φρόνησιν καὶ δικαιοσύνην καρτερίαν τε καὶ ὑπομονὴν καὶ τὴν σεμνότητα καὶ ἐγκράτειαν τήν τε ἐπὶ τούτοις εὐσέβειαν. ἀλλʼ ἡ μὲν εὐσέβεια παντί που δήλη τὸ ἀνωτάτω καὶ πρεσβύτατον αἴτιον σέβειν καὶ τιμᾶν καὶ διδάσκουσα. καὶ δικαιοσύνην δὲ αὐτὸς ὁ νόμος παρίστησι παιδεύων τήν τε φρόνησιν διὰ τῆς τῶν αἰσθητῶν εἰδώλων ἀποχῆς καὶ τῆς πρὸς τὸν ποιητὴν καὶ πατέρα τῶν ὅλων προσκληρώσεως, ἀφʼ ἧς δόξης οἷον πηγῆς πᾶσα σύνεσις αὔξεται.

English · Claude translation

All the other virtues recorded by Moses are plain, which supplied the Greeks with the beginning of the whole field of ethics: I mean courage, self-restraint, prudence, and justice, endurance and patience, reverence and self-control, and godliness in addition to these. Godliness is evident to everyone, teaching to worship and honor the highest and oldest cause. And the law itself presents justice, training it, and prudence, through abstaining from idols perceived by the senses and attaching oneself to the Maker and Father of the universe; from which belief, as from a spring, all understanding grows.

About this passage

Source

Stählin 2:153–154 · Otto Stählin, ed., Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. 2, Stromata Buch I–VI, GCS 15 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1906); vol. 3, Stromata Buch VII und VIII, GCS 17 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1909) · Greek text: Otto Stählin, Clemens Alexandrinus 2–3 (GCS 15, 17, 1906–1909), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library, CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in Stählin, GCS 15, 17. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Stählin (1906–1909); made independently of existing English translations.

Compare

Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made) · Book 3 is left partly untranslated (in Latin) there.

Topics

Ethics, Scripture and canon

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 2.18.78 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/2/18/78/).

Plain text

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 2.18.78 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/2/18/78/).