1 The reasoning of our father Eleazar, like a first-rate pilot, steering the vessel of piety in the sea of emotions, (WEB) 2 and flouted by the threats of the tyrant, and overwhelmed with the breakers of torture, (WEB) 3 in no way shifted the rudder of piety until it sailed into the harbor of victory over death. (WEB) 4 No besieged city has ever held out against many and various war machines as that holy man did when his pious soul was tried with the fiery trial of tortures and rackings and moved his besiegers through the religious reasoning that shielded him. (WEB) 5 For father Eleazar, projecting his disposition, broke the raging waves of the emotions as with a jutting cliff. (WEB) 6 O priest worthy of the priesthood! You didn’t pollute your sacred teeth, nor make your appetite, which had always embraced the clean and lawful, a partaker of profanity. (WEB) 7 O harmonizer with the law, and sage devoted to a divine life! (WEB) 8 Of such a character ought those to be who perform the duties of the law at the risk of their own blood, and defend it with generous sweat by sufferings even to death. (WEB) 9 You, father, have gloriously established our right government by your endurance; and making of much account our past service, prevented its destruction, and by your deeds, have made credible the words of philosophy. (WEB) 10 O aged man of more power than tortures, elder more vigorous than fire, greatest king over the emotions, Eleazar! (WEB) 11 For as father Aaron, armed with a censer, hastening through the consuming fire, vanquished the flame-bearing angel, (WEB) 12 so, Eleazar, the descendant of Aaron, wasted away by the fire, didn’t give up his reasoning. (WEB) 13 What is most wonderful is that though he was an old man, though the labors of his body were now spent, his muscles were relaxed, and his sinews worn out, he recovered youth. (WEB) 14 By the spirit of reasoning, and the reasoning of Isaac, he rendered powerless the many-headed rack. (WEB) 15 O blessed old age, and reverend hoar head, and life obedient to the law, which the faithful seal of death perfected. (WEB) 16 If, then, an old man, through religion, despised tortures even to death, then certainly religious reasoning is ruler of the emotions. (WEB) 17 But perhaps some might say, “It is not all who conquer emotions, as not all possess wise reasoning.” (WEB) 18 But those who have meditated upon religion with their whole heart, these alone can master the emotions of the flesh: (WEB) 19 they who believe that to God they don’t die; for, as our forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, they live to God. (WEB) 20 This circumstance, then, is by no means an objection, that some who have weak reasoning are governed by their emotions, (WEB) 21 since what person, walking religiously by the whole… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 7:1–25
Semantically similar passages
4 Maccabees 15:31–32
31 For like Noah’s ship, bearing the world in the world-filling flood, bore up against the waves, (WEB) 32 so you, the guardian of the law, when surrounded on every side by the flood of emotions, and assaulted by violent storms which were the torments of your children, bo… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 1:8–10
8 but I will prove it with the greatest force from the fortitude of Eleazar, and seven kindred, and their mother, who suffered death in defense of virtue. (WEB) 9 For all these, treating pains with contempt even to death, by this contempt, demonstrated that reasoning ha… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 9:21–23
21 Although the framework of his bones was now destroyed, the high-minded and Abrahamic youth didn’t groan. (WEB) 22 But, as though transformed by fire into immortality, he nobly endured the rackings, saying, (WEB) 23 “Imitate me, O kindred. Never desert your station, nor renounce… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 16:1–2
1 If, then, even a woman, and that an aged one, and the mother of seven children, endured to see her children’s torments even to death, it must be admitted that religious reasoning is master even of the emotions. (WEB) 2 I have proved, then, that not only men have obtai… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 6:29–31
29 Let my blood be a purification for them, and take my life in exchange for theirs.” (WEB) 30 Thus speaking, the holy man departed, noble in his torments, and even to the agonies of death resisted in his reasoning for the sake of the law. (WEB) 31 Confessedly, therefore, religious… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 11:20–22
20 He, while tormented, said, “O good and holy contest, in which for the sake of religion, we kindred have been called to the arena of pain, and have not been conquered. (WEB) 21 For religious understanding, O tyrant, is unconquered. (WEB) 22 Armed with upright virtue, I also will… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 9:17–19
17 he answered, “Not so powerful, O accursed lackeys, is your wheel, as to stifle my reasoning. Cut my limbs, and burn my flesh, and twist my joints. (WEB) 18 For through all my torments I will convince you that the children of the Hebrews are alone unconquered on behalf… (WEB) 19 … (WEB)
4 Maccabees 3:17–19
17 For the temperate mind has power to conquer the pressure of the emotions, to quench the fires of excitement, (WEB) 18 and to wrestle down the pains of the body, however excessive, and through the excellency of reasoning, to spurn all the assaults of the emotions. (WEB) 19 But th… (WEB)
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