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While Ben Sira’s poem on wisdom and fear of God (Sir 1:11–21) draws on earlier texts from the Hebrew Bible, it transfers the rewards for wisdom (Prov 1–9) and the blessings for Torah obedience (Deut 30:15–16) onto the fear of the Lord. The poem also exhibits parallels to some Dead Sea Scroll texts, including the Qumran Wisdom Admonition (4Q185) and the Treatise on the Two Spirits from the Community Rule (1QS III, 13–IV, 26). Since Sir 1:14 teaches that wisdom has been given in the womb to the faithful Jews, the “eternal foundation” (1:15) may be a reference to the Jerusalem temple.

This preface surveys developments in Ben Sira research, pertinent to the topic, since the publication of the first edition in 2002. Because the second edition is not a rewriting of the first edition, this preface seeks to take account of the last two decades of Ben Sira scholarship. The original edition of the study was the revised and updated form of my 1996 doctoral dissertation at the Catholic University of America, Washington DC. The work was written under the guidance of the late Alexander Di Lella (1929- 2019), known especially for his Anchor Bible commentary, which he wrote jointly with Patrick Skehan. My 2002 volume also acknowledges its debt to the 1996 essay collection, based on papers given at the 1995 Salzburg symposium on friendship in Ben Sira.

Entre las composi- ciones más oscuras de la Biblia, el Salmo 110 (109) revela el patrón de un ritual de entronización real, comparable, en parte a las cere- monias narradas en el Libro de los Reyes (1 Re 1: 32-53; 2 Reyes 11: 4-20). Este artículo proporciona una exégesis del difícil poema hebreo, observando paralelos con textos reales de Egipto y Mesopotamia. El presente trabajo considera las diferencias en la versión griega del texto. Aunque algunos ecos del Salmo 110 aparecen dentro de la descripción de la investidura de Simón Macabeo como líder cívico y sumo sacerdote (1 Macabeos 14), los macabeos eran sacerdotes que tomaban el poder civil en lugar de reyes que eran nombrados sacer - dotes (Sal 110,4). Por lo tanto, el salmo parece provenir de la pri- mera monarquía, alrededor del tiempo en que todavía era posible decir que “los hijos de David eran sacerdotes” (2 Sam 8:18)