Zhingoora Bible Series - The Bible Douay-Rheims, the Challoner Revision- Book 25 Book of Wisdom

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Title: The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Book 25: Wisdom The Challoner Revision

Release Date: June, 2005 [EBook #8325][Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule][This file was first posted on July 4, 2003]

Edition: 10

Language: English

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE BIBLE, DOUAY-RHEIMS, BOOK 25***

This eBook was produced by David Widgerfrom etext #1581 prepared by Dennis McCarthy, Atlanta, Georgiaand Tad Book, student, Pontifical North American College, Rome.

Translated from the Latin Vulgate

Diligently Compared with the Hebrew, Greek,and Other Editions in Divers Languages

THE OLD TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Douay
A.D. 1609 & 1610

and

THE NEW TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Rheims
A.D. 1582

With Annotations

The Whole Revised and Diligently Compared withthe Latin Vulgate by Bishop Richard ChallonerA.D. 1749-1752

This Book is so called, because it treats of the excellence of WISDOM,the means to obtain it, and the happy fruits it produces. It is writtenin the person of Solomon, and contains his sentiments. But it isuncertain who was the writer. It abounds with instructions andexhortations to kings and all magistrates to minister justice in thecommonwealth, teaching all kinds of virtues under the general names ofjustice and wisdom. It contains also many prophecies of Christ's coming,passion, resurrection, and other Christian mysteries. The whole may bedivided into three parts. In the first six chapters, the authoradmonishes all superiors to love and exercise justice and wisdom. In thenext three, he teacheth that wisdom proceedeth only from God, and isprocured by prayer and a good life. In the other ten chapters, hesheweth the excellent effects and utility of wisdom and justice.

Wisdom Chapter 1

An exhortation to seek God sincerely, who cannot be deceived, anddesireth not our death.

1:1. Love justice, you that are the judges of the earth. Think of theLord in goodness, and seek him in simplicity of heart:

1:2. For he is found by them that tempt him not: and he sheweth himselfto them that have faith in him.

1:3. For perverse thoughts separate from God: and his power, when it istried, reproveth the unwise:

1:4. For wisdom will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in abody subject to sins.

1:5. For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, andwill withdraw himself from thoughts that are without understanding, andhe shall not abide when iniquity cometh in.

1:6. For the spirit of wisdom is benevolent, and will not acquit theevil speaker from his lips: for God is witness of his reins, and he is atrue searcher of his heart, and a hearer of his tongue.

1:7. For the Spirit of the Lord hath filled the whole world: and thatwhich containeth all things, hath knowledge of the voice.

1:8. Therefore he that speaketh unjust things, cannot be hid, neithershall the chastising judgment pass him by.

1:9. For inquisition shall be made into the thoughts of the ungodly, andthe hearing of his words shall come to God, to the chastising of hisiniquities.

1:10. For the ear of jealousy heareth all things, and the tumult ofmurmuring shall not be hid.

1:11. Keep yourselves, therefore, from murmuring, which profitethnothing, and refrain your tongue from detraction, for an obscure speechshall not go for nought: and the mouth that belieth, killeth the soul.

1:12. Seek not death in the error of your life, neither procure yedestruction by the works of your hands.

1:13. For God made not death, neither hath he pleasure in thedestruction of the living.

1:14. For he created all things that they might be: and he made thenations of the earth for health: and there is no poison of destructionin them, nor kingdom of hell upon the earth.

1:15. For justice is perpetual and immortal.

1:16. But the wicked with works and words have called it to them: andesteeming it a friend, have fallen away and have made a covenant withit: because they are worthy to be of the part thereof.

Wisdom Chapter 2

The vain reasonings of the wicked: their persecuting the just,especially the Son of God.

2:1. For they have said, reasoning with themselves, but not right: Thetime of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there isno remedy, and no man hath been known to have returned from hell:

2:2. For we are born of nothing, and after this we shall be as if we hadnot been: for the breath in our nostrils is smoke: and speech a spark tomove our heart,

2:3. Which being put out, our body shall be ashes, and our spirit shallbe poured abroad as soft air, and our life shall pass away as the traceof a cloud, and shall be dispersed as a mist, which is driven away bythe beams of the sun, and overpowered with the heat thereof:

2:4. And our name in time shall be forgotten, and no man shall have anyremembrance of our works.

2:5. For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no goingback of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth:

2:6. Come, therefore, and let us enjoy the good things that are present,and let us speedily use the creatures as in youth.

2:7. Let us fill ourselves with costly wine, and ointments: and let notthe flower of the time pass by us.

2:8. Let us crown ourselves with roses, before they be withered: let nomeadow escape our riot.

2:9. Let none of us go without his part in luxury: let us every whereleave tokens of joy: for this is our portion, and this our lot.

2:10. Let us oppress the poor just man, and not spare the widow, norhonour the ancient grey hairs of the aged.

2:11. But let our strength be the law of justice: for that which isfeeble is found to be nothing worth.

2:12. Let us, therefore, lie in wait for the just, because he is not forour turn, and he is contrary to our doings, and upbraideth us withtransgressions of the law, and divulgeth against us the sins of our wayof life.

2:13. He boasteth that he hath the knowledge of God, and calleth himselfthe son of God.

2:14. He is become a censurer of our thoughts.

2:15. He is grievous unto us, even to behold: for his life is not likeother men's, and his ways are very different.

2:16. We are esteemed by him as triflers, and he abstaineth from ourways as from filthiness, and he preferreth the latter end of the just,and glorieth that he hath God for his father.

2:17. Let us see then if his words be true, and let us prove what shallhappen to him, and we shall know what his end shall be.

2:18. For if he be the true son of God, he will defend him, and willdeliver him from the hands of his enemies.

2:19. Let us examine him by outrages and tortures, that we may know hismeekness, and try his patience.