Saturday, December 30, 2023

For God is n[either] destitute [nor stingy], having, for his [own] glory, made you, too, a god.

Source
οὐ γὰρ πτωκεύει θεὸς καὶ σὲ θεὸν ποιήσας εἰς δόξαν αὐτοῦ.

     St. Hippolytus (c. 170-c. 236), Refutatio omnium haeresium X.33, translation mine.  Greek from Hippolytus Werke, vol. 3 =GCS, ed. H. Achelis and G. Bonwetsch, vol. 26, ed. Paul Wendland (1916), p. 293, line 15.  Immediate context:  creation in and restoration to the imago DeiA few additional translations of this sentence, of "much concern to commentators" (F. Legge):

  • Liturgy of the hours:  "God is not beggarly, and for the sake of his own glory he has given us a share in his divinity."  According to the Oxford Latin dictionary, mendicus can mean both "destitute," and "beggarly" or "mean" (stingy).  But that latter sense is not given prominence in the Greek lexica, just for example the Patristic Greek lexicon.
  • M. David Litwa, 2015:  "God is not poor; for his glory, he makes you also a god!"
  • F. Legge, 1921:  "For God asks no alms, and has made thee God for His own glory."
  • J. H. MacMahon, ANF 5:  "For the Deity, (by condescension,) does not diminish aught of the divinity of His divine perfection; having made thee even God unto His glory!"

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