Anakalypsis / Unveiling the Word
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Codex Sinaiticus Aleph c. AD 330-360 Codex Vaticanus B c. AD 300-325
What is Sirach 20 about?

Timely silence and timely speech govern the chapter, which teaches that a rebuke given at the right moment is better than anger nursed in silence, yet that a wise man holds his tongue until the hour is right. Ben Sira contrasts the fool, whose gifts and words win no favor, with the prudent, and warns that a lie is an ugly stain on a man. He observes that wisdom hidden away is as useless as treasure buried out of sight. Discretion in when to speak and when to keep still is commended as practical wisdom.

Historical backdrop

Ben Sira taught in Jerusalem around 180 BC, in the last calm before the storm. Judea had passed from Ptolemaic to Seleucid hands, Greek ways pressed in from every side, and the second temple still stood in the glory the high priest Simon had restored, the Simon whose splendor the book remembers. Within a generation Antiochus would defile that temple, and the grandson who carried the work to Egypt and turned it into Greek wrote in the aftermath, for the Jews of Alexandria.

The Church Fathers on Sirach 20
Deuterocanon (Catholic & Orthodox) · Accepted as canonical Scripture by the Catholic and Orthodox traditions and included in the original 1611 KJV (between the Old and New Testaments). Not in the Protestant 66-book canon. Read with the same care you bring to other Scripture, conscious that Protestants and Catholics weigh its authority differently.

Sirach 20

Sirach Chapter 20
20
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What is Sirach 20 about?

Timely silence and timely speech govern the chapter, which teaches that a rebuke given at the right moment is better than anger nursed in silence, yet that a wise man holds his tongue until the hour is right. Ben Sira contrasts the fool, whose gifts and words win no favor, with the prudent, and warns that a lie is an ugly stain on a man. He observes that wisdom hidden away is as useless as treasure buried out of sight. Discretion in when to speak and when to keep still is commended as practical wisdom.