54 BrADLey C. GreGOry The Latin also contains this addition concerning avarice, but places it after the rhetorical question, “How can dust and ashes be proud?,” in 10,9: “there is nothing more evil than to love money for he puts up for sale even his own soul” (nihil est iniquius quam amare pecuniam hic enim et animam suam venalem habet) 52. However, be- fore this rhetorical question, the Latin also contains a doublet of the first part of this addition: “but there is nothing more wicked than avarice” (avaro autem nihil est scelestius) 53. in the larger context, this strongly correlates pride with covetousness and implies that the unjust use of imperial power is motivated by the love of money and embold- ened by pride to carry out the seizure of wealth. This addition creates an interesting relationship with the claim that pride is the source of every sin in 10,13 (15). A synchronic reading of 10,6-18 in the Latin suggests that, while pride underlies every sin, when it is coordinated with power it allows the desire for money to take action in the form of imperial oppression and violence. even if avarice is traced to some inflection of pride, it may still be judged to be the most wicked instantiation of pride 54. in the discussion of miserliness in 14,3-10 the Latin reflects two changes significant for the vice of greed. in 14,3a the Greek states that “riches are not fitting for a small-minded person”. The word “small- minded” (mikrolo,goj) is a hapax legomenon in the LXX but has the sense of pettiness, especially with money, and thus it is a fortuitous approximation of the Hebrew !jq bl (literally, “small of heart”) and an appropriate synonym for “miser” in the next line 55. The Latin, however, shifts the meaning slightly by translating this term with cu- pido et tenaci, “covetous and stingy” 56. Since tenaci is an understand- able translation of mikrolo,goj, “covetous” is the supplemental term. While the Latin shows a tendency to translate one Greek term with 52 D: nihil est iniquius quam amare pecuniam tales enim etiam animam suam venundant. See THieLe, Sirach, 363. 53 THieLe, Sirach, 361-362. 54 However, it was possible for ancient thinkers to hold differing views on the relative severity of vices, depending on the rhetorical contexts. For example, at different places, sometimes within the same work, Philo claims that different vices lead to (every) other vice: pride (Flacc. 91); drunkenness (Flacc. 136); desire (Spec. iV, 84-85), lying (Contempl. 39); and greed (Flacc. 60). See GreGOry, “Pride and Sin”, 225-227. 55 See C. WAGner, Die Septuaginta-Hapaxlegomena im Buch Jesus Sirach (BZAW 282; Berlin 1999) 250. 56 D: cupido tenaci. See THieLe, Sirach, 430.