Sophia Scriptura

Miscellanies 4.7.53

Clement of Alexandria · Miscellanies · ca. 198–203 · Alexandria · Read in context

Summary: Salvation proceeds from fear to hope to love; the Greeks submit unwillingly to blind necessity, as Euripides says.

Greek text · Stählin 2:272–273

παρακαλῶ οὖν ὑμᾶς, μιμηταί μου γίνεσθε, φησίν. ὁ μὲν οὖν πρῶτος βαθμὸς τῆς σωτηρίας ἡ μετὰ φόβον διδασκαλία, διʼ ἣν ἀπεχόμεθα τῆς ἀδικίας, δεύτερος δὲ ἡ ἐλπίς, διʼ ἣν ἐφιέμεθα τῶν βελτίστων, τελειοῖ δὲ ἡ ἀγάπη, ὡς προσῆκόν ἐστι, γνωστικῶς ἤδη παιδεύουσα. Ἕλληνες γὰρ οὐκ οἶδʼ ὅπως ἀνάγκῃ δεδωκότες ἀλόγῳ τὰ συμβαίνοντα ἄκοντες πείθεσθαι ὁμολογοῦσιν. ὁ γοῦν Εὐριπίδης λέγει· ἅ γʼ οὖν παραινῶ, ταῦτά μου δέξαι, γύναι. ἔφυ μὲν οὐδεὶς ὅστις οὐ πονεῖ βροτῶν, θάπτει τε τέκνα καὶ ἕτερα σπείρει νέα, αὐτός τε θνῄσκει. καὶ τάδʼ ἄχθονται βροτοί. εἶτα ἐπιφέρει· ταῦτα δεῖ στέγειν ἅπερ δεῖ κατὰ φύσιν διεκπερᾶν· οὐ δεινὸν οὐδὲν τῶν ἀναγκαίων βροτοῖς.

English · Claude translation

“I urge you, then, be imitators of me,” he says. The first step of salvation, then, is instruction with fear, through which we abstain from injustice; the second is hope, through which we desire the best things; and love perfects, as is fitting, now training in the way of knowledge. The Greeks, I do not know how, having handed what happens over to irrational necessity, confess that they obey it unwillingly. Euripides, at any rate, says: “Accept from me, woman, what I advise. No mortal was ever born who does not toil; he buries children and begets other new ones, and dies himself. And mortals are grieved at this.” Then he adds: “We must bear what must by nature be passed through; nothing necessary is terrible for mortals.”

About this passage

Source
Stählin 2:272–273 · 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.
Scripture
Extrabiblical texts
  • Euripides, Hypsipyle frag. 757 (Euripides (plays and fragments)) · quotation, high confidence
Topics
Ethics

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotations are 1 Cor 4:16 and Euripides, Hypsipyle (fragment 757 Nauck).

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 4.7.53 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/4/7/53/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 4.7.53 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/4/7/53/).

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