Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 3.7.1 (15.1)

Summary: Stones rolling off the road are doubters who leave the true way.

Greek text · Lake, LCL 25:42–44

Τοὺς δὲ ἑτέρους λίθους, οὓς εἶδες μακρὰν ἀπὸ τοῦ πύργου ῥιπτομένους καὶ πίπτοντας εἰς τὴν ὁδὸν καὶ κυλιομένους ἐκ τῆς ὁδοῦ εἰς τὰς ἀνοδίας· οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ πεπιστευκότες μέν, ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς διψυχίας αὐτῶν ἀφίουσιν τὴν ὁδὸν αὐτῶν τὴν ἀληθινήν· δοκοῦντες οὖν βελτίονα ὁδὸν δύνασθαι εὑρεῖν, πλανῶνται καὶ ταλαιπωροῦσιν περιπατοῦντες ἐν ταῖς ἀνοδίαις.

English · Claude translation

And the other stones, which you saw thrown far from the tower and falling onto the road and rolling from the road into the pathless places: these are those who have believed, but because of their double-mindedness they abandon their true way; thinking, then, that they can find a better way, they go astray and are miserable, walking in pathless places.

About this passage

Source

Lake, LCL 25:42–44 · Kirsopp Lake, ed. and trans., The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 2, LCL 25 (London: Heinemann; New York: Macmillan, 1913), 6–71 · 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); 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)

Cite this passage

Herm. Vis. 3.7.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/herm-vis/3/7/1/).

Plain text

Herm. Vis. 3.7.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/herm-vis/3/7/1/).