Anakalypsis / Unveiling the Word
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⚙ Annotations & References ▾
Historic voices 1 ▾
Catechism of the Catholic Church 1× 27-31
Manuscript witnesses 2 ▾
Codex Sinaiticus Aleph c. AD 330-360 Codex Vaticanus B c. AD 300-325
What is Sirach 37 about?

True and false friends open the chapter, where Ben Sira distinguishes the companion who is a friend only in name, or who turns enemy in a quarrel, from the faithful friend who stands by in trouble. He warns against taking counsel from the self-interested, a rival, a coward, a merchant weighing a bargain, and urges instead a godly adviser whose heart matches your own, above all prayer to the Most High for right direction. The chapter ends with moderation at the table, noting that gluttony has killed many while the careful man lengthens his life. Practical throughout, it teaches that the fear of the Lord guides the choice of friends, counselors, and even the measure of one's appetite.

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 37
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 37

Sirach Chapter 37
37
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What is Sirach 37 about?

True and false friends open the chapter, where Ben Sira distinguishes the companion who is a friend only in name, or who turns enemy in a quarrel, from the faithful friend who stands by in trouble. He warns against taking counsel from the self-interested, a rival, a coward, a merchant weighing a bargain, and urges instead a godly adviser whose heart matches your own, above all prayer to the Most High for right direction. The chapter ends with moderation at the table, noting that gluttony has killed many while the careful man lengthens his life. Practical throughout, it teaches that the fear of the Lord guides the choice of friends, counselors, and even the measure of one's appetite.