Sophia Scriptura

Miscellanies 5.14.128

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

Summary: Philemon denies that Fortune is a god, and Sophocles says that all things depend on the supreme God, who holds the beginning and the end.

Greek text · Stählin 2:412–413

καλῶς οὖν καὶ Φιλήμων ὁ κωμικὸς τὴν εἰδωλολατρείαν ἐκκόπτει διὰ τούτων· οὐκ ἔστιν ἡμῖν οὐδεμία Τύχη θεός, οὐκ ἔστιν, ἀλλὰ ταὐτόματον ὃ γίγνεται ὡς ἔτυχεν ἑκάστῳ, προσαγορεύεται τύχη. Σοφοκλῆς δὲ ὁ τραγῳδοποιὸς οὐδὲ θεοῖς, λέγει, αὐθαίρετα πάντα πέλονται, νόσφι Διός· κεῖνος γὰρ ἔχει τέλος ἠδὲ καὶ ἀρχήν.

English · Claude translation

Well, then, does Philemon the comic poet too cut down idolatry in these words: “For us there is no god Fortune, no; but what happens by itself, as it falls out for each, is called fortune.” And Sophocles the tragic poet says: “Not even for the gods do all things happen by their own choice, apart from Zeus; for he holds the end and the beginning.”

About this passage

Source
Stählin 2:412–413 · 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
  • Sophocles (Sophocles (plays and fragments)) · quotation, medium confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotations are Philemon, fragment 137 (Kock), and verses ascribed to Sophocles (not in his surviving plays; unidentified, possibly not genuine).

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.14.128 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/14/128/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.14.128 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/14/128/).

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