Екклезиастик (Книга Премудрости Иисуса, сына Сирахова), Глава 1, стих 14. Толкования стиха

FROM FEAR OF GOD TO WISDOM. AUGUSTINE: Isaiah the prophet presents us with those seven well-known spiritual gifts. He begins with wisdom and ends with the fear of God, as though he were coming down from the heights to our level. He does this to teach us to climb back up again. Thus, he began from where we want to finish, and he arrived at the point where we should begin. “Here will rest on him,” he says, “the Spirit of God, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and courage, the Spirit of knowledge and piety, the Spirit of the fear of the Lord.” Therefore, just as he descended from wisdom to fear—not because he was slipping back but in order to teach—we in the same way must climb from fear to wisdom. We do this not as a matter of pride but in order to progress. “For the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” SERMON 347.2.

Страх Господень доставляет долгоденствие; потому что добродетельный не предается распутству, которое сокращает жизнь человека.

Срав. Еккл. 8:12. Благочестие доставляет блаженство человеку даже в настоящей жизни. Если сие блаженство не приходит в лета юношеския, или в мужеском возрасте; то последние дни благочестиваго старца будут спокойны и приятны. Он, по прошествии времени искушения, тихо перейдет в лучшую жизнь.

Боящийся Бога на краю гроба не трепещет при мысли о Божественном Судии, в благости Котораго он совершенно уверен.

Т. е низводит на человека любовь Божию и ведет его таким путем, на котором он может сохранить сию любовь. Сих слов, равно и 14· стиха, нет во многих Греческих рукописях.

FROM FEAR TO HOLINESS. GREGORY OF NAZIANZUS: Since grace has been given to us to flee from superstitious error and to be joined to the truth and to serve the living and true God and to rise above creation—passing by all that is subject to time and motion—let us look at and reason on God and divine things in a way that corresponds to this grace given us. But let us begin our discussion of them from the most fitting point. And the most fitting is what Solomon laid down for us: The beginning of wisdom, he says, is to get wisdom. And what this is he tells us: The beginning of wisdom is fear. For we must not begin with contemplation and leave off with fear—for an unbridled contemplation would perhaps push us over a precipice. Rather, we must be grounded and purified and so to say made light by fear, and thus we may be raised to the height. For where fear is there is keeping of commandments, and where there is keeping of commandments there is purifying of the flesh, that cloud that covers the soul and does not allow it to see the divine Ray. And where there is purifying there is illumination, and illumination is the satisfying of desire to those who long for the greatest things, or the greatest Thing or that which surpasses all greatness. ON THE HOLY LIGHTS, ORATION 39.8.

Свои наставления писатель начинает похвалою премудрости. Премудрость происходит от Господа и обладает божественными свойствами и совершает божественныя действия. Она состоит в страхе Божием, который составляет и начало, и полноту, и венец, и корень премудрости.