Sophia Scriptura

Epistle of Barnabas 3.2

Anonymous · Epistle of Barnabas · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · place unknown · Read in context

Traditional ascription rejected: The letter names no author. From Clement of Alexandria (late second century) onward it was ascribed to Barnabas, Paul's companion (Acts 4:36), but its date and its hostility to Jewish practice make that unlikely; modern scholars treat it as anonymous.

Summary: Outward signs of fasting are not enough.

Greek text · Lake, LCL 24:346

οὐδʼ ἂν κάμψητε ὡς κρίκον τὸν τράχηλον ὑμῶν καὶ σάκκον ἐνδύσησθε καὶ σποδὸν ὑποστρώσητε, οὐδʼ οὕτως καλέσετε νηστείαν δεκτήν.

English · Claude translation

not even if you bend your neck like a ring and put on sackcloth and spread ashes beneath you, not even so will you call it an acceptable fast.”

About this passage

Source
Lake, LCL 24:346 · Kirsopp Lake, ed. and trans., The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 1, LCL 24 (London: Heinemann; New York: Macmillan, 1912), 340–407 · Greek text: K. Lake, The Apostolic Fathers (LCL, 1912), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library and published by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Lake, LCL 24. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Lake (LCL 24, 1912); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Scripture
Topics
Fasting

Cite this passage

Barn. 3.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/barnabas/3/2/).

Plain text
Barn. 3.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/barnabas/3/2/).

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