Sophia Scriptura

Miscellanies 5.11.77

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

Summary: Plato says the highest truth cannot be written but is kindled in the soul like a flame; a prophecy ascribed to Zephaniah describes angels in the fifth heaven praising the ineffable God.

Greek text · Stählin 2:377

εἰκότως οὖν ἐν τῇ μεγάλῃ ἐπιστολῇ ῥητὸν γὰρ φησὶν οὐδαμῶς ἐστιν ὡς τὰ ἄλλα μαθήματα, ἀλλʼ ἐκ πολλῆς ξυνουσίας γιγνομένης περὶ τὸ πρᾶγμα αὐτὸ καὶ τοῦ συζῆν ἐξαίφνης οἷον ἀπὸ πυρὸς πηδήσαντος ἐξαφθὲν φῶς ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ γενόμενον αὐτὸ ἑαυτὸ ἤδη τρέφει. ἆρʼ οὐχ ὅμοια ταῦτα τοῖς ὑπὸ Σοφονία λεχθεῖσι τοῦ προφήτου; καὶ ἀνέλαβέν με πνεῦμα καὶ ἀνήνεγκέν με εἰς οὐρανὸν πέμπτον καὶ ἐθεώρουν ἀγγέλους καλουμένους κυρίους, καὶ τὸ διάδημα αὐτῶν ἐπικείμενον ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ καὶ ἦν ἑκάστου αὐτῶν ὁ θρόνος ἑπταπλασίων φωτὸς ἡλίου ἀνατέλλοντος, οἰκοῦντας ἐν ναοῖς σωτηρίας καὶ ὑμνοῦντας θεὸν ἄρρητον ὕψιστον.

English · Claude translation

Fittingly, then, in the long letter he says: “For it can in no way be put into words like other lessons, but after long association with the matter itself, and living with it, suddenly, like a light kindled from a leaping fire, it comes to be in the soul and from then on nourishes itself.” Are not these things like what was said by the prophet Zephaniah? “And the Spirit took me up and carried me up into the fifth heaven, and I beheld angels called lords, and their diadem was set on them in the Holy Spirit; and the throne of each of them was seven times brighter than the light of the rising sun; they dwelt in temples of salvation and hymned the ineffable God Most High.”

About this passage

Source
Stählin 2:377 · 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.
Extrabiblical texts
  • Plato, Ep. 7, 341c–d (Plato (works)) · quotation, high confidence
  • Apoc. Zeph. (Apocalypse of Zephaniah) · quotation, medium confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotations are Plato, Seventh Letter 341c–d, and a lost apocryphal Apocalypse of Zephaniah (not the canonical book of Zephaniah).

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.11.77 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/11/77/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.11.77 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/11/77/).

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