Ben Sira 38:10-20

10 Give up your faults and direct your hands rightly, and cleanse your heart from all sin.
11 Offer a sweet-smelling sacrifice, and a memorial portion of choice flour, and pour oil on your offering, as much as you can afford.
12 Then give the physician his place, for the Lord created him; do not let him leave you, for you need him.
13 There may come a time when recovery lies in the hands of physicians,
14 for they too pray to the Lord that he grant them success in diagnosis and in healing, for the sake of preserving life.
15 He who sins against his Maker, will be defiant toward the physician.
16 My child, let your tears fall for the dead, and as one in great pain begin the lament. Lay out the body with due ceremony, and do not neglect the burial.
17 Let your weeping be bitter and your wailing fervent; make your mourning worthy of the departed, for one day, or two, to avoid criticism; then be comforted for your grief.
18 For grief may result in death, and a sorrowful heart saps one's strength.
19 When a person is taken away, sorrow is over; but the life of the poor weighs down the heart.
20 Do not give your heart to grief; drive it away, and remember your own end.

Footnotes 4

  • [a]. Heb: Lat lacks [as much as you can afford]; Meaning of Gk uncertain
  • [b]. Gk [in their hands]
  • [c]. Heb: Gk [rest]
  • [d]. Heb: Gk [may he fall into the hands of the physician]
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.