Wisdom of Solomon — Chapter 2
The ungodly plot against the righteous
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Greek-source study and notes · III. Wisdom
Their reasoning about life and death
2:1 For they said among themselves, reasoning wrongly:
“Our life is short and sorrowful,
and there is no healing when a human being dies,
and no one has been known to return from Hades.
2:2 For we came into being by chance,
and afterward we will be as though we had not existed;
for the breath in our nostrils is smoke,
and reason is a spark in the movement of our heart;
2:3 when it is extinguished, the body will become ashes,
and the spirit will disperse like insubstantial air.
2:4 And our name will be forgotten in time,
and no one will remember our works;
our life will pass like the traces of a cloud,
and will disperse like mist,
driven away by the sun’s rays
and weighed down by its heat.
2:5 For our allotted time is the passing of a shadow,
and there is no turning back from our end,
because it has been sealed, and no one returns.
2:6 Come, then, and let us enjoy the good things that exist,
and eagerly make use of creation as in youth.
2:7 Let us fill ourselves with costly wine and perfumes,
and let no spring blossom pass us by.
2:8 Let us crown ourselves with rosebuds before they wither.
2:9 Let none of us be without a share in our revelry;
let us leave tokens of our enjoyment everywhere,
for this is our portion, and this our lot.
The plot against the righteous person
2:10 Let us oppress the poor righteous person;
let us not spare a widow,
nor show regard for an old man’s many years of gray hair.
2:11 Let our strength be the law of righteousness,
for what is weak is shown to be useless.
2:12 Let us lie in wait for the righteous person, because he is troublesome to us
and opposes our works;
he reproaches us for sins against law
and charges us with sins against our upbringing.
2:13 He professes to have knowledge of God
and calls himself a child of the Lord.
2:14 He has become a reproach to our thoughts;
even the sight of him weighs upon us,
2:15 because his life is unlike that of others,
and his paths are different.
2:16 He reckons us counterfeit,
and keeps away from our ways as from impurities;
he calls the final lot of the righteous blessed,
and boasts that God is his father.
2:17 Let us see whether his words are true,
and test what will happen at his departure.
2:18 For if the righteous person is a son of God, He will help him
and rescue him from the hand of his opponents.
2:19 Let us examine him with insult and torture,
so that we may know his gentleness
and test his endurance of wrong.
2:20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death,
for, according to his words, he will be visited with care.”
Their blindness and God’s purpose
2:21 They reasoned these things and went astray,
for their wickedness blinded them;
2:22 they did not know the mysteries of God,
nor hope for a reward of holiness,
nor recognize a prize for blameless souls.
2:23 For God created the human being for incorruption
and made him an image of His own eternity;
2:24 but through the devil’s envy death entered the world,
and those who belong to his portion experience it.
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.
Source numbering retained: chapter 17 ends at 17:20.
2:1 The narrator explicitly identifies the following speech as mistaken reasoning; its claims are not presented as the narrator’s own conclusions.
2:2 Λόγος can denote word, speech, or reason. ‘Reason’ is adopted in this account of bodily life and thought.
2:3 The relative refers to the preceding spark. ‘Insubstantial’ renders χαῦνος, which can convey loose, empty, or unsubstantial.
2:4 The final passive literally carries the sense ‘made heavy/burdened.’ The unusual physical image is retained, rather than harmonized to evaporation language.
2:9 The declared main text reads ‘none of us,’ μηδεὶς ἡμῶν. No alternate ‘meadow’ reading is adopted or claimed to have been collated.
2:11 The speakers make power the norm of right; the narrative framing in 2:1 and 2:21 remains essential.
2:12 Παιδεία concerns education, training, or upbringing. Both accusations are retained; the Greek has no named lawgiver. Saints: Augustine, The City of God 17.20, quotes Wisdom 2:12–21 and interprets the persecution of the righteous person as prophecy of Christ’s passion. This is his explicit Christian reading; the translation retains the passage’s unnamed righteous person. [AUG-CG17]
2:13 Παῖς can mean child or servant. ‘Child’ is adopted because 2:16 speaks of God as father and 2:18 explicitly uses ‘son.’ The lexical distinction from υἱός in 2:18 remains recorded.
2:16 Κίβδηλος carries the image of false or debased coin. The final possessive ‘his’ is supplied by English from the sense of boasting of God as father.
2:17 Ἔκβασις can denote outcome or departure; the following death sentence gives the expression its immediate setting.
2:18 Υἱός explicitly means son. ‘He’ marks God as the understood subject of help and rescue; the righteous person’s pronouns remain lowercase.
2:19 Ἀνεξικακία is patient endurance of evil or injury; it is not merely physical strength.
2:20 Ἐπισκοπή is visitation or oversight; in the speakers’ challenge it concerns the care or intervention he expects. The irony is not replaced with an added assertion of rescue.
2:21 The narrator resumes and rejects the preceding reasoning.
2:23 The declared Greek reads ἀϊδιότης, ‘eternity’ or everlastingness. ‘Incorruption’ retains ἀφθαρσία and is not silently substituted for the distinct term immortality.
2:24 Διάβολος is rendered devil; the word can denote a slanderer or accuser. The closing ‘it’ refers to death; the preceding personification and ‘his portion’ leave a pronoun relation that deserves explicit review rather than silent expansion.
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