Evil is the man with a grudging eye: Good News Translation expresses the meaning of this line but without its force, saying “A selfish person is evil.” The word for Evil is emphatic in the Greek; anything that calls attention to it in translation would be helpful. A better rendering is “A stingy person is an evil person.” An even better one is “A stingy person is downright evil.” A grudging eye refers to resenting the idea of helping anyone who needs help. Someone with a grudging eye does not want to give things to other people.

He averts his face and disregards people: “He turns his back on” (Good News Translation) is a good English idiomatic equivalent for the literal He averts his face. The meaning of this clause is that the miser turns his back on people who are in need. Good News Translation brings this out by combining it with disregards people, saying “he turns his back on people’s needs,” but this may weaken the meaning somewhat. Disregards people is literally “overlooks [or, disregards] souls [or, lives].” New Jerusalem Bible expresses this well with “careless of others’ lives.” A better model for this line is “He turns his back on [or, his face away from] all human need.” Or we may say “He has no concern for any of the needs of other people.”

An alternative model for this verse is:

• A stingy person is an evil person. He has no concern for any of the needs of other people.

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.