Sophia Scriptura

Miscellanies 5.10.65

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

Summary: Plato wrote about God in riddles and warned against writing down the highest things; Paul likewise speaks hidden wisdom among the perfect.

Greek text · Stählin 2:369–370

Εἰκότως τοίνυν καὶ Πλάτων ἐν ταῖς Ἐπιστολαῖς περὶ θεοῦ διαλαμβάνων φραστέον δή σοι φησὶ διʼ αἰνιγμάτων, ἵνʼ ἤν τι ἡ δέλτος ἢ πόντου ἢ γῆς ἐν πτυχαῖς πάθῃ, ὁ ἀναγνοὺς μὴ γνῷ. ὁ γὰρ τῶν ὅλων θεὸς ὁ ὑπὲρ πᾶσαν φωνὴν καὶ πᾶν νόημα καὶ πᾶσαν ἔννοιαν οὐκ ἄν ποτε γραφῇ παραδοθείη, ἄρρητος ὢν δυνάμει τῇ αὑτοῦ. ὅπερ καὶ αὐτὸ δεδήλωκεν Πλάτων λέγων· πρὸς ταῦτʼ οὖν σκοπῶν εὐλαβοῦ, μή ποτέ σοι μεταμελήσῃ τῶν νῦν ἀναξίως ἐκπεσόντων· μεγίστη δὲ φυλακὴ τὸ μὴ γράφειν, ἀλλʼ ἐκμανθάνειν· οὐ γὰρ ἔστιν, οὐκ ἔστιν τὰ γραφέντα μὴ οὐκ ἐκπεσεῖν. ἀδελφὰ τούτοις ὁ ἅγιος ἀπόστολος Παῦλος λέγει, τὴν προφητικὴν καὶ τῷ ὄντι ἀρχαίαν σῴζων ἐπίκρυψιν, ἀφʼ ἧς τὰ καλὰ τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐρρύη δόγματα· σοφίαν δὲ λαλοῦμεν ἐν τοῖς τελείοις, σοφίαν δὲ οὐ τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου οὐδὲ τῶν ἀρχόντων τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου τῶν καταργουμένων· ἀλλὰ λαλοῦμεν θεοῦ σοφίαν ἐν μυστηρίῳ, τὴν ἀποκεκρυμμένην.

English · Claude translation

Fittingly, then, Plato too, dealing with God in his Letters, says: “I must speak to you in riddles, so that, if the tablet should suffer anything in the folds of sea or land, the one who reads it may not understand.” For the God of the universe, who is above every word and every thought and every conception, could never be handed down in writing, being ineffable in his power. Plato himself has shown this very thing, saying: “Considering these things, then, take care that you never regret what has now been let out unworthily. The greatest safeguard is not to write but to learn by heart; for it is not possible, it is not possible, that what is written should not get out.” Akin to these things, the holy apostle Paul says, preserving the prophetic and truly ancient concealment from which the fine doctrines flowed to the Greeks: “But we speak wisdom among the perfect, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are being brought to nothing; but we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom.”

About this passage

Source
Stählin 2:369–370 · 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
  • Plato, Ep. 2, 312d (Plato (works)) · quotation, high confidence
  • Plato, Ep. 2, 314a–c (Plato (works)) · quotation, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotations are Plato, Second Letter 312d and 314a–c, and 1 Cor 2:6–7. That the Greeks' good doctrines flowed from the Hebrew prophets is a recurring claim of Clement's.

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.10.65 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/10/65/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.10.65 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/10/65/).

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