Sirach — Chapter 31
Wealth, Food, and Wine
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Hebrew–Greek comparison and notes · III. Wisdom
31:1 Wakefulness over wealth wastes the flesh, and anxiety about it drives away sleep.
31:2 The anxiety of wakefulness will drive away drowsiness, and a severe illness will rouse a person from sleep.
31:3 A rich person toiled in gathering money, and at rest he is filled with his luxuries.
31:4 A poor person toiled with a diminished livelihood, and at rest he becomes needy.
31:5 The one who loves gold will not be justified, and the one who pursues profits will go astray in them.
31:6 Many were given over to ruin for gold, and their destruction happened before their face.
31:7 It is a stumbling block for those infatuated with it, and every fool will be caught by it.
31:8 Happy is the rich person who was found blameless and did not go after gold.
31:9 Who is he? We will call him happy, for he has done wonderful things among his people.
31:10 Who was tested by it and brought to completion? It will be a boast for him. Who could have transgressed and did not transgress, could have done evil things and did not do them?
31:11 His good circumstances will be established, and the assembly will recount his almsgiving.
31:12 Have you sat at a great table? Do not open your throat over it or say, “How much there is upon it!”
31:13 Remember that an evil eye is bad. What has been created worse than an eye? Therefore it weeps for every reason.
31:14 Do not stretch your hand toward whatever it looks at, and do not crowd together with it in the dish.
31:15 Understand your neighbor’s concerns from yourself, and consider every matter.
31:16 Eat what is set before you like a human being, and do not chew greedily, lest you be hated.
31:17 Be the first to stop for the sake of good discipline; do not be insatiable, lest you stumble.
31:18 If you have sat among many, do not stretch out your hand before them.
31:19 How sufficient a little is for an instructed person! He does not pant upon his bed.
31:20 Healthy sleep comes with a moderate stomach. He rises early, and his soul is with him. The pain of sleeplessness, bilious vomiting, and cramp accompany an insatiable man.
31:21 If you have been forced to eat too much, rise, vomit at a distance, and you will find rest.
31:22 Listen to me, child, and do not despise me; at the last you will find my words true. In all your works be skillful, and no illness will meet you.
31:23 Lips will bless the generous provider of bread, and testimony to his excellence is trustworthy.
31:24 A city will grumble against someone stingy with bread, and testimony to his meanness is precise.
31:25 Do not show your manliness with wine, for wine has destroyed many.
31:26 A furnace tests hardened metal in quenching; so wine tests hearts in the quarrel of the proud.
31:27 Wine is like life for human beings if you drink it in its measure. What is life for someone lacking wine? It too was created for human gladness.
31:28 Wine drunk at the proper time in sufficient measure is rejoicing of heart and gladness of soul.
31:29 Wine drunk in quantity amid provocation and conflict is bitterness of soul.
31:30 Drunkenness multiplies a fool’s anger to his stumbling, diminishing strength and adding wounds.
31:31 At a wine banquet do not rebuke your neighbor or despise him in his gladness. Do not speak a reproachful word to him or distress him with a demand for repayment.
Source and editorial notes
Working translation preserved from the recovered manuscript of 8 September 2026. Declared source: Septuaginta, Rahlfs–Hanhart, 2006, Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, publisher’s Greek main text. Independent linguistic and critical-apparatus review remains outstanding. Source-access and reception claims in the inherited notes have not been freshly revalidated. Chapter and section headings are editorial.
The translator’s prologue is separate from the 51 chapters. Its eight source units map to publisher labels 1, 1a–1g; main-text 1:1 maps to 1h. Source 5:15 includes material often numbered 6:1, so chapter 6 begins at 6:2. Source label gaps are preserved; no text is invented.
31:7 The source’s wooden stumbling object, ξύλον προσκόμματος, is represented by stumbling block; infatuation renders the strong ἐνθουσιάζουσιν.
31:13 For every reason provisionally renders ἀπὸ παντὸς προσώπου, literally from every face or presence; the exact idiom remains open.
31:14 It follows the eye in the preceding verse; the singular pronoun’s relation to another diner remains compressed.
31:20 Bilious vomiting renders χολέρας in its ancient bodily sense, without identifying the modern infectious disease. The source’s soul-with-him image is retained.
31:21 The explicit ancient banquet instruction is retained as translated text, without adding a technique or modern medical claim.
31:22 True supplies the sense of finding the words confirmed; the final proverbial assurance is retained as the author’s statement.
31:26 The metal-testing image is retained without specifying a modern alloy.
31:27 The positive statement is retained alongside the warnings against excess.
31:31 All four restrictions are retained; the last concerns a financial demand in context.