1 But you, our God, are gracious and true, patient, and in mercy ordering all things. (WEB) 2 For even if we sin, we are yours, knowing your dominion; but we will not sin, knowing that we have been accounted yours. (WEB) 3 For to be acquainted with you is perfect righteousness, and to know your dominion is the root of immortality. (WEB) 4 For we weren’t led astray by any evil plan of men’s, nor yet by painters’ fruitless labor, a form stained with varied colors, (WEB) 5 the sight of which leads fools into lust. Their desire is for the breathless form of a dead image. (WEB) 6 Lovers of evil things, and worthy of such hopes, are those who make, desire, and worship them. (WEB) 7 For a potter, kneading soft earth, laboriously molds each article for our service. He fashions out of the same clay both the vessels that minister to clean uses, and those of a contrary sort, all in like manner. What shall be the use of each article of either sort, the potter is the judge. (WEB) 8 Also, laboring to an evil end, he molds a vain god out of the same clay, he who, having but a little before been made of earth, after a short space goes his way to the earth out of which he was taken, when he is required to give back the soul which was lent him. (WEB) 9 However he has anxious care, not because his powers must fail, nor because his span of life is short; But he compares himself with goldsmiths and silversmiths, and he imitates molders in brass, and considers it great that he molds counterfeit gods. (WEB) 10 His heart is ashes. His hope is of less value than earth. His life is of less honor than clay, (WEB) 11 because he was ignorant of him who molded him, and of him that inspired into him an active soul, and breathed into him a vital spirit. (WEB) 12 But he accounted our life to be a game, and our lifetime a festival for profit; for, he says, one must get gain however one can, even if it is by evil. (WEB) 13 For this man, beyond all others, knows that he sins, out of earthy matter making brittle vessels and engraved images. (WEB) 14 But most foolish and more miserable than a baby, are the enemies of your people, who oppressed them; (WEB) 15 because they even considered all the idols of the nations to be gods, which have neither the use of eyes for seeing, nor nostrils for drawing breath, nor ears to hear, nor fingers for handling, and their feet are helpless for walking. (WEB) 16 For a man made them, and one whose own spirit is borrowed molded them; for no one has power as a man to mold a god like himself. (WEB) 17 But, being mortal, he makes a dead thing by the work of lawless hands; for he is better than the objects of his worship, since he indeed had life, but they never did. (WEB) 18 Yes, and they worship the creatures that are m… (WEB)
Wisdom of Solomon 15:1–19
Semantically similar passages
Wisdom of Solomon 14:7–9
7 For blessed is wood through which comes righteousness; (WEB) 8 but the idol made with hands is accursed, itself and he that made it; because his was the working, and the corruptible thing was called a god. (WEB) 9 For both the ungodly and his ungodliness are alike hateful to G… (WEB)
Wisdom of Solomon 13:9–11
9 For if they had power to know so much, that they should be able to explore the world, how is it that they didn’t find the Sovereign Lord sooner? (WEB) 10 But they were miserable, and their hopes were in dead things, who called them gods which are works of men’s hands,… (WEB) 11 … (WEB)
2 Esdras 8:59–61
59 For as the things I have said will welcome you, so thirst and pain which are prepared for them. For the Most High didn’t intend that men should be destroyed, (WEB) 60 but those who are created have themselves defiled the name of him who made them, and were unthankful t… (WEB)
Wisdom of Solomon 12:23–25
23 Therefore also the unrighteous that lived in a life of folly, you tormented through their own abominations. (WEB) 24 For truly they went astray very far in the ways of error, Taking as gods those animals which even among their enemies were held in dishonor, deceived li… (WEB)
Wisdom of Solomon 13:2–4
2 But they thought that either fire, or wind, or swift air, or circling stars, or raging water, or luminaries of heaven were gods that rule the world. (WEB) 3 If it was through delight in their beauty that they took them to be gods, let them know how much better their S… (WEB)
Epistle to Diognetus 2:4–6
4 Could not these things which are now worshipped by you, by human hands again be made vessels like the rest? Are not they all deaf and blind, are they not soul-less, senseless, motionless? Do they not all rot and decay? (DIO) 5 These things ye call gods, to these ye ar… (DIO)
Baruch 6:45–47
45 They are fashioned by carpenters and goldsmiths. They can be nothing else than what the workmen make them to be. (WEB) 46 And they themselves who fashioned them can never continue long. How then should the things that are fashioned by them? (WEB) 47 For they have left lies and r… (WEB)
2 Baruch 15:1–3
1 And the Lord answered and said unto me: 'Thou art rightly astonied regarding the departure of (2BA) 2 man, but thou hast not judged well regarding the evils which befall those who sin. And as regards (2BA) 3 what thou hast said, that the righteous are carried off and the impio… (2BA)
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