Shepherd of Hermas, Similitude 5.2.3 (55.3)

Summary: The slave fences the vineyard and sees the weeds.

BothGreekEnglish

Greek text · Lake, LCL 25:154

ἐξελθόντος δὲ αὐτοῦ ἔλαβεν ὁ δοῦλος καὶ ἐχαράκωσε τὸν ἀμπελῶνα. καὶ τελέσας τὴν χαράκωσιν τοῦ ἀμπελῶνος εἶδε τὸν ἀμπελῶνα βοτανῶν πλήρη ὄντα.

When he had gone, the slave took and fenced the vineyard. And when he had finished fencing the vineyard, he saw that the vineyard was full of weeds.

Source: Lake, LCL 25:154 · Kirsopp Lake, ed. and trans., The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 2, LCL 25 (London: Heinemann; New York: Macmillan, 1913), 138–305 · Greek text: K. Lake, The Apostolic Fathers (LCL, 1912-1913), 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 25. 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 25, 1913), and from the ancient Latin version where Lake prints it because the Greek is lost (from Sim. 9.30.3); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare: Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)

Herm. Sim. 5.2.3 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/herm-sim/5/2/3/).

Plain text

Herm. Sim. 5.2.3 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/herm-sim/5/2/3/).