Sophia Scriptura

Epistle of Barnabas 8.2

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: The calf is Jesus; those who offer it are those who killed him.

Greek text · Lake, LCL 24:368

νοεῖτε, πῶς ἐν ἁπλότητι λέγει ὑμῖν. ὁ μόσχος ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐστίν, οἱ προσφέροντες ἄνδρες ἁμαρτωλοὶ οἱ προσενέγκαντες αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τὴν σφαγήν. εἶτα οὐκέτι ἄνδρες, οὐκέτι ἁμαρτωλῶν ἡ δόξα.

English · Claude translation

Understand how simply he speaks to you. The calf is Jesus; the sinful men who offer it are those who brought him to the slaughter. Then there are no longer men, no longer the glory of sinners.

About this passage

Source
Lake, LCL 24:368 · 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)
Topics
Christology

Notes

Translation notes

  • The last sentence is obscure; it may mean that after this, sinners have no more part in the rite.

Cite this passage

Barn. 8.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/barnabas/8/2/).

Plain text
Barn. 8.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/barnabas/8/2/).

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