Do not disobey the fear of the Lord: This means “Do not refuse to comply with the duty to honor the Lord.” Good News Translation states it in a positive form: “Be faithful in the practice of your religion.” Here “the practice of your religion” translates the fear of the Lord. An alternative model is “Faithfully obey the Lord” (Contemporary English Version).

Do not approach him with a divided mind: There is a serious problem of interpretation here. The Greek pronoun translated him is ambiguous; it could as easily refer to the fear of the Lord, and in the judgment of the Handbook, it does. It is taken this way by An American Translation, New Jerusalem Bible, Shekan, New American Bible, and apparently by Good News Translation, which represents the pronoun by the idea of “worship the Lord.” The author is telling us not to approach this business of serving the Lord with a divided mind (literally “with a divided heart”), that is, with anything less that singleness of purpose, wholehearted devotion. Good News Translation‘s model is good, but could be improved by saying “when you serve the Lord, you must do it with all your heart.” A similar thought is found in James 1.8 and 4.8.

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.