Wisdom of Solomon 15

1 But you, our God, are kind and true, patient, and govern everything with mercy. 2 Even if we sin, we belong to you, because we know your power. Yet we will not sin, because we know that we are counted as yours. 3 To know you is complete righteousness, and to know your power is the root of immortality.

4 No malicious human invention deceived us, nor did the painter’s fruitless labor—an image stained with varied colors. 5 The sight of it arouses desire in fools, and they long for the lifeless form of a dead image. 6 Those who make them, those who desire them, and those who worship them are lovers of evil and deserve to place their hopes in such things.

7 A potter kneads soft earth and laboriously shapes every vessel for our service. From the same clay he forms vessels that serve clean purposes and others that serve the opposite purposes alike. The potter himself decides how each one will be used. 8 Then, laboring wickedly, he shapes an empty god from the same clay. He himself was made from earth only a short time ago and will soon return to the earth from which he was taken, when the loan of his life is demanded back. 9 His concern is not that he is about to die or that his life is brief. Instead he competes with goldsmiths and silversmiths, imitates workers in bronze, and takes pride in making counterfeits. 10 His heart is ashes, his hope is worth less than earth, and his life is more dishonorable than clay, 11 because he failed to know the one who formed him, breathed into him an active soul, and breathed into him a living spirit. 12 People like this regard our life as a game and our time here as a profitable festival. They say, “A person must make a profit from somewhere, even if it comes from evil.” 13 This man knows better than anyone that he sins when he makes fragile vessels and carved images from earthy material.

14 But the enemies who oppressed your people are utterly foolish and more wretched than the soul of an infant, 15 because they regarded all the nations’ idols as gods. These idols have no eyes able to see, no nostrils to draw in air, no ears to hear, and no fingers to feel; their feet are useless for walking. 16 A human being made them, and someone whose own spirit was borrowed shaped them. No human being can shape a god equal to himself. 17 Though mortal, he makes a dead thing with lawless hands. He is better than the objects he worships, because he lived, but they never did. 18 They even worship the most hateful animals, which are worse than the rest when compared by their lack of understanding. 19 They do not possess enough beauty to be desired even as animals. They have missed both God’s praise and his blessing.