Wisdom 13-14

Revised Standard Version

13 For all men who were ignorant of God were foolish by nature;
and they were unable from the good things that are seen to know him who exists,
nor did they recognize the craftsman while paying heed to his works;
² but they supposed that either fire or wind or swift air,
or the circle of the stars, or turbulent water,
or the luminaries of heaven were the gods that rule the world.
³ If through delight in the beauty of these things men^[a] assumed them to be gods,
let them know how much better than these is their Lord,
for the author of beauty created them.
⁴ And if men^[b] were amazed at their power and working,
let them perceive from them
how much more powerful is he who formed them.
⁵ For from the greatness and beauty of created things
comes a corresponding perception of their Creator.
⁶ Yet these men are little to be blamed,
for perhaps they go astray
while seeking God and desiring to find him.
⁷ For as they live among his works they keep searching,
and they trust in what they see, because the things that are seen are beautiful.
⁸ Yet again, not even they are to be excused;
⁹ for if they had the power to know so much
that they could investigate the world,
how did they fail to find sooner the Lord of these things?

¹⁰ But miserable, with their hopes set on dead things, are the men
who give the name “gods” to the works of men’s hands,
gold and silver fashioned with skill,
and likenesses of animals,
or a useless stone, the work of an ancient hand.
¹¹ A skilled woodcutter may saw down a tree easy to handle
and skilfully strip off all its bark,
and then with pleasing workmanship
make a useful vessel that serves life’s needs,
¹² and burn the castoff pieces of his work
to prepare his food, and eat his fill.
¹³ But a castoff piece from among them, useful for nothing,
a stick crooked and full of knots,
he takes and carves with care in his leisure,
and shapes it with skill gained in idleness;^[c]
he forms it like the image of a man,
¹⁴ or makes it like some worthless animal,
giving it a coat of red paint and coloring its surface red
and covering every blemish in it with paint;
¹⁵ then he makes for it a niche that befits it,
and sets it in the wall, and fastens it there with iron.
¹⁶ So he takes thought for it, that it may not fall,
because he knows that it cannot help itself,
for it is only an image and has need of help.
¹⁷ When he prays about possessions and his marriage and children,
he is not ashamed to address a lifeless thing.
¹⁸ For health he appeals to a thing that is weak;
for life he prays to a thing that is dead;
for aid he entreats a thing that is utterly inexperienced;
for a prosperous journey, a thing that cannot take a step;
¹⁹ for money-making and work and success with his hands
he asks strength of a thing whose hands have no strength.

14 Again, one preparing to sail and about to voyage over raging waves
calls upon a piece of wood more fragile than the ship which carries him.
² For it was desire for gain that planned that vessel,
and wisdom was the craftsman who built it;
³ but it is thy providence, O Father, that steers its course,
because thou hast given it a path in the sea,
and a safe way through the waves,
⁴ showing that thou canst save from every danger,
so that even if a man lacks skill, he may put to sea.
⁵ It is thy will that works of thy wisdom should not be without effect;
therefore men trust their lives even to the smallest piece of wood,
and passing through the billows on a raft they come safely to land.
⁶ For even in the beginning, when arrogant giants were perishing,
the hope of the world took refuge on a raft,
and guided by thy hand left to the world the seed of a new generation.
⁷ For blessed is the wood by which righteousness comes.

¹² For the idea of making idols was the beginning of fornication,
and the invention of them was the corruption of life,
¹³ for neither have they existed from the beginning
nor will they exist for ever.
¹⁴ For through the vanity of men they entered the world,
and therefore their speedy end has been planned.
¹⁵ For a father, consumed with grief at an untimely bereavement,
made an image of his child, who had been suddenly taken from him;
and he now honored as a god what was once a dead human being,
and handed on to his dependents secret rites and initiations.
¹⁶ Then the ungodly custom, grown strong with time, was kept as a law,
and at the command of monarchs graven images were worshiped.
¹⁷ When men could not honor monarchs^[d] in their presence, since they lived at a distance,
they imagined their appearance far away,
and made a visible image of the king whom they honored,
so that by their zeal they might flatter the absent one as though present.
¹⁸ Then the ambition of the craftsman impelled
even those who did not know the king to intensify their worship.
¹⁹ For he, perhaps wishing to please his ruler,
skilfully forced the likeness to take more beautiful form,
²⁰ and the multitude, attracted by the charm of his work,
now regarded as an object of worship the one whom shortly before they had honored as a man.
²¹ And this became a hidden trap for mankind,
because men, in bondage to misfortune or to royal authority,
bestowed on objects of stone or wood the name that ought not to be shared.