The Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach, or Ecclesiasticus 31:8 Commento

How can one approve those who seem to dominate in this world, if they do less than they can? The Scripture praises precisely the one “who could have sinned but did not, who did not run after gold.” Gold must follow you, and not you gold. In fact, gold is a good thing—certainly God created nothing evil. Don’t you be evil, then, and the gold good. See here, I place some gold between an upright person and a dishonest one. If the dishonest person takes it, the poor are oppressed, magistrates corrupted, laws broken, social life upset. Why? Because a dishonest person took the gold. If the upright person were to have it, the poor would be sustained, the naked clothed, the oppressed liberated, prisoners redeemed. How much good is derived from the gold the honest person has, and how many evils from the gold of the dishonest person! To what end, therefore, do you say in disgust, “And what if gold did not exist at all?” You should not love gold. If you are dishonest, you will follow gold. If you are upright, it will follow you. What does “it will follow you” mean? That you will rule it and not be made its servant, because you will possess it, rather than being possessed by it.