Sirach — Chapter 48
Elijah, Elisha, Hezekiah, and Isaiah
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Hebrew–Greek comparison and notes · III. Wisdom
48:1 Then Elijah arose, a prophet like fire, and his word burned like a torch.
48:2 He brought famine upon them and made them few through his zeal.
48:3 By the Lord’s word he held back heaven; in the same way he brought down fire three times.
48:4 How glorious you became, Elijah, through your wonders! Who can boast of being like you?
48:5 You raised a dead man from death and from Hades by the word of the Most High.
48:6 You brought kings down to destruction and glorious men from their bed.
48:7 You heard rebuke at Sinai and judgments of vengeance at Horeb.
48:8 You anointed kings for retribution, and prophets as successors after him.
48:9 You were taken up in a whirlwind of fire, in a chariot with fiery horses.
48:10 You were recorded in rebukes for appointed times: to still anger before wrath, to turn a father’s heart toward a son, and to restore the tribes of Jacob.
48:11 Blessed are those who saw you and those who have fallen asleep in love; for we too will surely live.
48:12 Elijah was covered by a whirlwind, and Elisha was filled with his spirit. In his days he was not shaken by a ruler, and no one overpowered him.
48:13 No word surpassed him, and even in sleep his body prophesied.
48:14 In his life he performed portents, and at his end his works were wondrous.
48:15 Through all these things the people did not repent or turn away from their sins, until they were plundered from their land and scattered throughout all the earth.
48:16 The people were left few in number, with a ruler in David’s house. Some of them did what was pleasing, but others multiplied sins.
48:17 Hezekiah fortified his city and brought water into its midst. With iron he dug through a steep rock and built reservoirs for water.
48:18 In his days Sennacherib came up and sent Rabshakeh, and he departed. He raised his hand against Zion and boasted greatly in his arrogance.
48:19 Then their hearts and hands were shaken, and they suffered pangs like women giving birth.
48:20 They called upon the merciful Lord, spreading their hands toward Him. The Holy One quickly heard them from heaven and redeemed them by Isaiah’s hand.
48:21 He struck the Assyrians’ camp, and His angel destroyed them.
48:22 For Hezekiah did what was pleasing to the Lord and stood strong in the ways of his father David, which Isaiah the prophet commanded, great and faithful in his vision.
48:23 In his days the sun went backward, and He added life to the king.
48:24 With a great spirit he saw the last things and comforted those mourning in Zion.
48:25 He showed what would happen to the end of the age, and hidden things before they came to pass.
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.
48:3 “Three times” is the source’s count and is not harmonized by selecting only one narrative episode.
48:8 The shift from the address “you” to “after him” follows the source’s αὐτόν. No second-person pronoun is silently substituted.
48:10 The source has singular “father” and “son.” It names Jacob’s tribes without adding an identification of Elijah’s later fulfillment.
48:11 The final expression is literally “we will live with life,” an emphatic affirmation. “In love” has no expressed object, so “love for you” is not inserted.
48:12 “Covered” renders ἐσκεπάσθη rather than repeating the different taking-up verb of verse nine. The subsequent subject is understood as Elisha.
48:13 The phrase “no word surpassed him” is preserved in its generality; it is not silently changed to “nothing was too difficult.” Sleep here continues the account into death.
48:17 The engineering description is translated without adding the name or measurements of a tunnel.
48:18 The clause καὶ ἀπῆρεν, “and he departed,” is retained. The Greek does not explicitly identify the subject of each successive action. Rabshakeh is retained in its conventional name form without claiming that it was a personal name rather than a title.
48:23 God is understood as the subject of “added”; the preceding clause explicitly names the sun as its subject. No number of added years is present here.
48:24 The prophet Isaiah is understood as the returning subject. “A great spirit” is not expanded into an explicit title of the Holy Spirit absent from the Greek.