Proverbs 15:8
The victims of the wicked are abominable to the Lord: the vows of the just are acceptable.
Open Proverbs 15:8 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Victimæ impiorum abominabiles Domino ; vota justorum placabilia.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- θυσίαι ἀσεβῶν βδέλυγμα Κυρίῳ, εὐχαὶ δὲ κατευθυνόντων δεκταὶ παρ᾽ αὐτῷ.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- זֶ֣בַח רְ֭שָׁעִים תּוֹעֲבַ֣ת יְהוָ֑ה וּתְפִלַּ֖ת יְשָׁרִ֣ים רְצוֹנֽוֹ
Haydock's commentary
Wicked. Still unconverted, Ecclesiasticus xxxiv. 23. When they repent, and offer sacrifice with sincerity, they will obtain mercy. The Donatists abused this text, to prove that baptism conferred by wicked ministers was unavailing. But St. Augustine shewed them, that Christ was the principal agent, and conferred grace, even though the minister might draw down judgments on his own head. (Con. Parm. ii. 6.)
Even pagans confessed, that sacrifices, without virtue, could afford no benefit. "God was more pleased with the prayers of the Lacedemonians, than with all the sacrifices of the Greeks," say the idolatrous priests in Plato, Alcib. ii. Seneca de Ben. i. 5.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Clement of Alexandria The Stromata, or Miscellanies, Chapter XVIII. The Mosaic Law the Fountain of All Ethics, and the Source from Which the Greeks Drew Theirs
But it is clear to every one that piety, which teaches to worship and honour, is the highest and oldest cause; and the law itself exhibits justice, and teaches wisdom, by abstinence from sensible images, and by inviting to the Maker and Father of the universe. And from this sentiment, as from a fountain, all intelligence increases. “For the sacrifices of the wicked are abomination to the Lord ; but the prayers of the upright are acceptable before Him,” since “righteousness is more acceptable before God than sacrifice.” Such also as the following we find in Isaiah: “To what purpose to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? saith the Lord ;” and the whole section. …
St Gregory the Great Book IX, To Rechared, King of the Visigoths
I cannot express in words, most excellent son, how much I am delighted with thy work and thy life. For on hearing of the power of a new miracle in our days, to wit that the whole nation of the Goths has through thy Excellency been brought over from the error of Arian heresy to the firmness of a right faith, one is disposed to exclaim with the prophet, This is the change wrought by the right hand of the Most High ( Ps. lxxvi. 11 ). For whose breast, even though stony, would not, on hearing of so great a work, soften in praises of Almighty God and love of thy Excellency? As for me, I declare that it delights me often to tell these things that have been done through you to my sons who resort to me and often together with them to admire. …