James 1:25

παρακύψας : in Sir 14:20 ff. we read, Μακάριος ἀνὴρ ὂς ἐν σοφίᾳ τελευτήσει … ὁ παρακύπτων διὰ τῶν θυρίδων αὐτῆς. The word means literally to “peep into” with the idea of eagerness and concentration, see Genesis 26:8; Mayor says that the παρὰ “seems to imply the bending of the upper part of the body horizontally”; if this is so the word would be used very appropriately of a man poring over a roll of the Torah. εἰς νόμον τέλειον …: see above James 1:22. οὐκ ἀκροατὴς ἐπιλησμονῆς, etc.: Cf. with this what is quoted as a saying of our Lord in the Doctrina Addaei : “Thus did the Lord command us, that that which we preach before the people by word we should practise in deed in the sight of all” (Resch., op. cit., p. 285). ἐπιλησμονῆς : does not occur elsewhere in the N.T., and only very rarely in the Septuagint; see Sir 11:27, κάκωσις ὥρας ἐπιλησμονὴν ποιεῖ τρυφῆς. ἐν τῇ ποιήσει αὐτοῦ : only here in the N.T., cf. Sir 19:18 (Sir 19:20 in Greek), πᾶσα σοφία φόβος Κυρίου, καὶ ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ ποίησις νόμου; and Sir 51:19, καὶ ἐν ποιήσει μου ([53]

[54] read λιμοῦ) διηκριβασάμην (this clause does not exist in the Hebrew, and is probably a doublet); cf. Sir 16:26.

[53] Codex Vaticanus (sæc. iv.), published in photographic facsimile in 1889 under the care of the Abbate Cozza-Luzi.

[54] Codex Sinaiticus (sæc. iv.), now at St. Petersburg, published in facsimile type by its discoverer, Tischendorf, in 1862.