The Instructor 1.5.17 · Sophia Scriptura

Greek text · Stählin 1:100

Παῖδες οὖν εἰκότως οἱ θεὸν μόνον ἐγνωκότες πατέρα ἀφελεῖς καὶ νήπιοι καὶ ἀκέραιοι, οἱ κεράτων μονοκερώτων ἐρασταί. τοῖς γοῦν προβεβηκόσιν ἐν τῷ λόγῳ ταύτην ἐπεκήρυξεν τὴν φωνὴν ἀφροντιστεῖν κελεύων τῶν τῇδε πραγμάτων καὶ μόνῳ προσέχειν τῷ πατρὶ παραινῶν μιμουμένους τὰ παιδία. διὸ κἀν τοῖς ἐχομένοις λέγει »μὴ μεριμνᾶτε περὶ τῆς αὔριον· ἀρκετὸν γὰρ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ἡ κακία αὐτῆς.« οὕτως ἀποθεμένους τὰς τοῦ βίου φροντίδας ἐξέχεσθαι μόνου τοῦ πατρὸς παραγγέλλει. καὶ ὁ πληρῶν τὴν ἐντολὴν ταύτην τῷ ὄντι νήπιός τέ ἐστι καὶ παῖς θεῷ τε καὶ τῷ κόσμῳ, τῷ μὲν ὡς πεπλανημένος, τῷ δὲ ὡς ἠγαπημένος. εἰ δὲ »εἷς διδάσκαλος ἐν οὐρανοῖς,« ὥς φησιν ἡ γραφή, ὁμολογουμένως, οἱ ἐπὶ γῆς εἰκότως ἂν πάντες κεκλήσονται μαθηταί.

English · Claude translation

Rightly, then, those who have known God alone as Father are children: simple, infant, and pure, lovers of the unicorn's horns. To those who have advanced in the Word he proclaimed this saying, commanding them to take no thought for the affairs of this world and urging them to attend to the Father alone, imitating children. So in what follows he says: “Do not be anxious about tomorrow; sufficient for the day is its own evil.” So he commands them to lay aside the cares of life and to hold fast to the Father alone. And whoever fulfills this commandment is truly an infant and a child both to God and to the world: to the world as one who has gone astray, to God as one beloved. And if, as Scripture says, there is “one teacher in heaven,” then all on earth may rightly be called disciples.

About this passage

Source

Stählin 1:100 · Otto Stählin, ed., Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. 1, Protrepticus und Paedagogus, GCS 12 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1905) · Greek text: Otto Stählin, Clemens Alexandrinus 1: Protrepticus und Paedagogus (GCS 12, 1905), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Stählin (1905); made independently of existing English translations.

Scripture

Ps 22:21 (21:22 LXX) · allusion, medium confidence
Matt 6:34 · quotation, high confidence
Matt 23:8 · quotation, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

“The unicorn's horns” (κέρατα μονοκερώτων) comes from Ps 22:21 (21:22 LXX) and Deut 33:17; Clement uses it as a figure of single-minded devotion.
The quotations are Matt 6:34 and Matt 23:8.

Notes on the original text

Digital text corrected (stray period in the digital text, which splits the sentence; stray space before the closing quotation mark): τὴν φωνήν. ἀφροντιστεῖν → τὴν φωνὴν ἀφροντιστεῖν; ῖς, « → ῖς,«.

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Paed. 1.5.17 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-paedagogus/1/5/17/).

Plain text

Clement of Alexandria, Paed. 1.5.17 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-paedagogus/1/5/17/).