For nothing does God love save him that dwells with wisdom.
But she reaches from one end of the world to the other with full strength, And ordereth all things graciously.
Her I loved and sought out from my youth, And I sought to take her for my bride, And I became enamoured of her beauty.
She glorifieth her noble birth in that it is given her to live with God, And the Sovereign Lord of all loved her.
For you love all things that are, And abhor none of the things which you did make; For never would you have formed anything if you did hate it.
But you spare all things, because they are your, O Soverign Lord, you lover of men’s lives;
But you did teach your people by such works as these, How that the righteous must be a lover of men; And you did make your sons to be of good hope, Because you give repentance when men have sinned.
For your nature manifested your sweetness toward your children; While that bread, ministering to the desire of the eater, Tempered itself according to every man’s choice.
For in all things, O Lord, you did magnify your people, And you did glorify them and not lightly regard them; Standing by their side in every time and place.
She is with all flesh according to his gift; And he gave her freely to those who love him.
They that fear the Lord will not disobey his words; And those who love him will keep his ways.
They that fear the Lord will seek his good pleasure; And those who love him will be filled with the law.
And he that gives glory to his mother is as one that lays up treasure.
And if he fails in understanding, have patience with him; And dishonor him not while you are in your full strength.
My son, go on with your business in meekness; So will you be beloved of an acceptable man.
Get yourself the love of the congregation; And to a great man bow your head.
Be as a father to the fatherless, And instead of a husband to their mother: So will you be as a son of the Most High, And he will love you more than your mother does.
He that loves her loves life; And those who seek to her early will be filled with gladness.
They that do her service will minister to the Holy One; And those who love her the Lord does love.
Then will she return again the straight way to him, And will gladden him, and reveal to him her secrets.
Let your soul love a wise servant; Defraud him not of liberty.
With all your strength love him that made you; And forsake not his ministers.
Be not lacking to those who weep; And mourn with those who mourn.
Be not slow to visit a sick man; For by such things you will gain love.
Every living creature loves his like, And every man loves his neighbor.
And as a mother shall she meet him, And receive him as a wife married in her virginity.
The Lord hates every abomination; And those who fear him love it not.
Gain trust with your neighbor in his poverty, That in his prosperity you may have gladness: Abide stedfast to him in the time of his affliction, That you may be heir with him in his inheritance.
I will not be ashamed to shelter a friend; And I will not hide myself from his face:
In three things I was beautified, And stood up beautiful before the Lord and men: The concord of kindred, and friendship of neighbors, And a woman and her husband that walk together in agreement.
Love a friend, and keep faith with him: But if you reveal his secrets, You shall not pursue after him;
He that shows mercy will lend to his neighbor; And he that strengthens him with his hand keeps the commandments.
Help your neighbor according to your power, And take heed to yourself that you fall not to the same.
He that loves his son will continue to lay stripes upon him, That he may have joy of him in the end.
Love your own soul, and comfort your heart: And remove sorrow far from you; For sorrow has destroyed many, And there is no profit therein.
Consider your neighbor’s liking by your own; And be discreet in every point.
Rebuke not your neighbor at a banquet of wine, Neither set him at nothing in his mirth: Speak not to him a word of reproach, And press not upon him by asking back a debt.
The eyes of the Lord are upon those who love him, A mighty protection and strong stay, A cover from the hot blast, and a cover from the noonday, A guard from stumbling, and a succour from falling.
And let them know you, as we also have known you, That there is no God but only you, O God.
The beauty of a woman cheers the countenance; And a man desires nothing so much.
Wine and music rejoice the heart; And the love of wisdom is above both.
A friend and a companion never meet amiss; And a wife with her husband is above both.
And he brought out of him a man of mercy, Which found favor in the sight of all flesh; A man beloved of God and men, even Moses, Whose memorial is blessed.
In every work of his he gave thanks to the Holy One Most High with words of glory; With his whole heart he sang praise, And loved him that made him.
Your name reached to the aisles afar off; And for your peace you were beloved.
But the Lord will never forsake his mercy; And he will not destroy any of his works, Nor blot out the posterity of his elect; And the seed of him that loved him he will not take away; And he gave a remnant to Jacob, And to David a root out of him.
Blessed are those who saw you, And those who have been beautified with love; For we also shall surely live.
He has found out all the way of knowledge, and has given it to Jacob his servant, and to Israel that is beloved of him.
And the two elders saw her going in every day, and walking; and they were inflamed with love for her.
And albeit they both were wounded with her love, yet dared not one show another his grief.
And Daniel said, You have remembered me, O God: neither have you forsaken those who love you.
cast them down with the sword of those who love you, and let all that know your name praise you with thanksgiving.
and he gave himself to deliver his people, and to get him an everlasting name;
coming forward as men ought to come that are resolute to repel such things as not even for the natural love of life is it lawful to taste.
But bending toward him, laughing the cruel tyrant to scorn, she spoke thus in the language of her fathers: My son, have pity upon me that carried you nine months in my womb, and gave you suck three years, and nourished and brought you up to this age, and sustained you.
For I am persuaded that he in gentleness and kindness will follow my purpose and treat you with indulgence.
But do you, O king, having informed yourself of these things severally, take thought both for our country and for our race, which is surrounded by foes, according to the gracious kindness with which you receive all.
And he kept Judas always in his presence; he had gained a hearty affection for the man;
A man leaves his own father that brought him up, and his own country, and cleaves to his wife.
and looks upon a lion, and walks in the darkness; and when he has stolen, plundered, and robbed, he brings it to his love.
Wherefore a man loves his wife better than father or mother.
and therewithal the king gaped and gazed upon her with open mouth: if she laughed upon him, he laughed also: but if she took any displeasure at him, he was fain to flatter, that she might be reconciled to him again.
And you did promise, out of love to the people of Israel, that should we fall away from you, and become afflicted, and then come to this house and pray, you would hear our prayer.
we resolved, not with strength of spear, but with gentleness and much humanity, as it were to nurse the inhabitants of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia, and to be their willing benefactors.
thought that they had come to the last moment of their lives, to the end of what they had tremblingly expected. They gave way, therefore, to lamentations and moans: they kissed each other: those nearest of kin to each other hung about one another’s necks: fathers about their sons, mother their daughters: other women held their infants to their breasts, which drew what seemed their last milk.
You⌃ have not as it were forsaken me, but your own selves, says the Lord.
Thus says the Lord Almighty, Have I not prayed you as a father his sons, as a mother her daughters, and a nurse her young babes,
Mother, embrace your children; I will bring them out with gladness like a dove; establish their feet; for I have chosen you, says the Lord.
and him you loved, and to him only you showed the end of the times secretly by night:
and among all the multitudes of peoples you have gotten you one people: and to this people, whom you loved, you gave a law that is approved of all.
And I said, Speak on, my Lord. Then said he to me, You are sore troubled in mind for Israel’s sake: love you that people better than he that made them?
Then said he to me, Just as you can do none of these things that I have spoken of, even so can you not find out my judgement, or the end of the love that I have promised to my people.
But we your people, whom you have called your firstborn, your only begotten, and your fervent lover, are given into their hands.
Take you no indignation at them which are deemed worse than beasts; but love those who have always put their trust in your glory.
For you come far short that you should be able to love my creature more than I. But you have brought yourself full near to the unrighteous. Let this never be.
And it prevails over marriage love, condemning it when transgressing law.
And it lords it over the love of parents toward their children, for they punish them for vice; and it domineers over the intimacy of friends, reproving them when wicked.
Be merciful to your people, and be satisfied with the punishment of me on their account.
Now you are not ignorant of the charm of brotherhood, which the Divine and all wise Providence has imparted through fathers to children, and has engendered through the mother’s womb.
and having been brought forth at equal intervals, and having sucked milk from the same springs, hence their brotherly souls are reared up lovingly together;
Brotherly love being thus sympathetically constituted, the seven kindred had a more sympathetic mutual harmony.
For a like ardour for what is right and honorable increased their fellow-feeling towards each other.
For it acting along with religion, made their brotherly feeling more desirable to them.
And yet, although nature and intercourse and virtuous morals increased their brotherly love those who were left endured to behold their kindred, who were ill-used for their religion, tortured even to death.
And more that this, they even urged them on to this ill-treatment; so that they not only despised pains themselves, but they even got the better of their affections of brotherly love.
And consider how comprehensive is the love of offspring, which draws every one to sympathy of affection,
where irrational animals possess a similar sympathy and love for their offspring with men.
And if not able to do this, they fly circling round them in agony of affection, calling out in their own note, and save their offspring in whatever manner they are able.
But sympathy with her children did not turn away the mother of the young men, who had a spirit kindred with that of Abraham.
O reasoning of the sons, lord over the passions, and religion more desirable to a mother than progeny!
The mother, when two things were set before here, religion and the safety of her seven sons for a time, on the conditional promise of a tyrant,
O in what way can I describe ethically the affections of parents toward their children, the resemblance of soul and of form engrafted into the small type of a child in a wonderful manner, especially through the greater sympathy of mothers with the feelings of those born of them!
for by how much mothers are by nature weak in disposition and prolific in offspring, by so much the fonder they are of children.
And of all mothers the mother of the seven was the fondest of children, who in seven childbirths had deeply engendered love toward them;
Not but that, on account of the excellent disposition to the law, her maternal affection toward them was increased.
For they were both just and temperate, and manly, and high-minded, and fond of their kindred, and so fond of their mother that even to death they obeyed her by observing the law.
And yet, though there were so many circumstances connected with love of children to draw on a mother to sympathy, in the case of none of them were the various tortures able to pervert her principle.
O holy nature and parental feeling, and reward of bringing up children, and unconquerable maternal affection!
But religious reasoning, having strengthened her courage in the midst of sufferings, enabled her to forego, for the time, parental love.
Although beholding the destruction of seven children, the noble mother, after one embrace, stripped off her feelings through faith in God.












