Sophia Scriptura

Miscellanies 5.2.15

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

Summary: Plato speaks of the love that begets like, and of teachers begetting pupils, as Christians call instruction rebirth and Paul begot the Corinthians in Christ; Empedocles speaks of Love, and Parmenides of seeing absent things with the mind.

Greek text · Stählin 2:335–336

ἐν δὲ τῷ Συμποσίῳ πᾶσι μὲν ἔρωτα φυσικὸν ἐγκεκρᾶσθαι λέγει τῆς τοῦ ὁμοίου γενέσεως, καὶ τοῖς μὲν ἀνθρώποις ἀνθρώπων μόνον, τῷ δὲ σπουδαίῳ τοῦ παραπλησίου. ἀδύνατον δʼ ἐστὶ τοῦτο ποιῆσαι τὸν σπουδαῖον μὴ ἔχοντα τελείους τὰς ἀρετάς, καθʼ ἃς παιδεύσει τοὺς προσιόντας νέους καί, ὡς ἐν Θεαιτήτῳ φησί, γεννήσει καὶ ἀνθρώπους ἀποτελέσει· κυεῖν γὰρ τοὺς μὲν κατὰ σῶμα, τοὺς δὲ κατὰ ψυχήν, ἐπεὶ καὶ παρὰ τοῖς βαρβάροις φιλοσόφοις τὸ κατηχῆσαί τε καὶ φωτίσαι ἀναγεννῆσαι λέγεται, καὶ ἐγὼ ὑμᾶς ἐγέννησα ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ ὁ καλός που λέγει ἀπόστολος. ὁ δὲ Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ἐν ταῖς ἀρχαῖς καὶ φιλότητα συγκαταριθμεῖται, συγκριτικήν τινα ἀγάπην νοῶν, ἣν σὺ νόῳ δέρκευ μηδʼ ὄμμασιν ἧσο τεθηπώς. ἀλλὰ καὶ Παρμενίδης ἐν τῷ αὐτοῦ ποιήματι περὶ τῆς Ἐλπίδος αἰνισσόμενος τὰ τοιαῦτα λέγει· λεῦσσε δʼ ὅμως ἀπεόντα νόῳ παρεόντα βεβαίως· οὐ γὰρ ἀποτμήξει τὸ ἐὸν τοῦ ἐόντος ἔχεσθαι οὔτε σκιδνάμενον πάντῃ πάντως κατὰ κόσμον οὔτε συνιστάμενον·

English · Claude translation

In the Symposium he says that a natural love for the begetting of what is like has been mixed into all, in men of men only, but in the good man of what is similar to him. And it is impossible for the good man to do this without having the virtues perfect, by which he will train the young who come to him, and, as he says in the Theaetetus, will beget and make them men; for some are pregnant in body and others in soul; since among the barbarian philosophers too, to instruct and enlighten is called to beget again; and “I begot you in Christ Jesus,” says the noble apostle somewhere. And Empedocles counts Love among the first principles, understanding it as a uniting love, “which you must see with the mind, and not sit amazed with your eyes.” And Parmenides too, in his poem, hinting at such things about Hope, says: “Behold things absent as firmly present to the mind; for you will not cut off what is from holding to what is, neither scattered everywhere in every way throughout the world, nor gathered together.”

About this passage

Source
Stählin 2:335–336 · 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, Symposium 206c–e; Theaetetus 150b–151b (Plato (works)) · allusion, high confidence
  • Empedocles, fragment 17 (Empedocles (fragments)) · quotation, high confidence
Topics
Baptism, Ethics

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotations and allusions are Plato, Symposium 206c–e, Theaetetus 150b–151b, 1 Cor 4:15, Empedocles (fragment 17), and Parmenides (fragment 4).

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.2.15 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/2/15/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.2.15 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/2/15/).

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