Wisdom 14:16
Then in process of time, wicked custom prevailing, this error was kept as a law, and statues were worshipped by the commandment of tyrants.
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- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Deinde interveniente tempore, convalescente iniqua consuetudine, hic error tamquam lex custoditus est, et tyrannorum imperio colebantur figmenta.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- εἶτα ἐν χρόνῳ κρατυνθὲν τὸ ἀσεβὲς ἔθος ὡς νόμος ἐφυλάχθη, καὶ τυράννων ἐπιταγαῖς ἐθρησκεύετο τὰ γλυπτά·
The Fathers on this verse
St John Chrysostom The Commentary and Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Galatians and Ephesians, Ephesians 5:5,6
We will examine, if you please, whence idolatry took its rise. A certain wise man ( Wisd. xiv. 16 .) tells us, that a certain rich man afflicted with untimely mourning for his son, and having no consolation for his sorrow, consoled his passion in this way: having made a lifeless image of the dead, and constantly gazing at it, he seemed through the image to have his departed one still; whilst certain flatterers, “whose God was their belly” ( Philip. iii. 19 .), treating the image with reverence in order to do him honor, carried on the custom into idolatry. So then it took its rise from weakness of soul, from a senseless custom, from extravagance. But not so covetousness: from weakness of soul indeed it is, only that it is from a worse weakness. It is not that any one has lost a son, nor that he is seeking for consolation in sorrow, nor that he is drawn on by flatterers. …