The fear of the Lord delights the heart: This means that revering the Lord makes a person happy. Good News Translation varies its vocabulary by translating fear as “honor” in this verse, and restructures the sentence by saying that honoring the Lord “is a heartfelt delight.” We may also render this as “If you revere the Lord, your heart will be filled with joy [or, delight].”

And gives gladness and joy and long life: The Greek word for gladness is the same as the one used in verse 11. The Greek word translated long life has to do with length of earthly life, not eternal life. Good News Translation has combined gladness and joy in the clause “it will give you a long and happy life,” which it connects with verse 13 as part of the same sentence. We may reorder the elements of the verse, moving long life to the beginning of the verse as follows:

• And if you fear him, your life will be long,
and your heart will be always filled with joy.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Sirach. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2008. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.