Human Wisdom Is Divine

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If you were asked to tell someone about the Bible, you would not begin with the Book of Proverbs. The stories of the Creation and the Garden of Eden and of Abraham and the Exodus attract us with their drama and depth. The heroism and struggles of Saul and David and the wisdom and generosity of Jesus captivate our imaginations. The covenants, commandments and prophecies of the Hebrew Bible and the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament draw our attention and call for our assent.

Against the grandeur of these narratives, the homely proverbs, warnings and exhortations of the Book of Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes (Qohelet) and of the apocryphal or deuterocanonical wisdom books, such as Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) and the Wisdom of Solomon, seem tame, even boring. Introductions and textbooks to the Hebrew Bible tack wisdom literature onto the end for a hurried review. In New Testament study, Jesus’ teachings about sin, salvation, suffering and the kingdom of God overshadow the practical advice that permeates his sermons, dialogues and discourses. The revelatory and unique, the theological and exaltedly moral, easily eclipse everyday realities and common sense.

The biblical authors themselves recognized this problem and combatted the tendency to trivialize wisdom by closely associating it with God and by presenting it as the key to life. Proverbs personifies wisdom as an attractive and comforting woman who appeals to young men (Proverbs 1:20–33, 9:1–6; see also Wisdom of Solomon 8:2–16). The teacher in Proverbs advises his students: “Get wisdom…Prize her highly and she will exalt you; she will honor you if you embrace her” (Proverbs 4:7–8). In Proverbs’ version of creation, wisdom was God’s first creation and God’s heavenly assistant when the world was made (Proverbs 8:22–31). According to Sirach, God told wisdom to make her home in Israel (Sirach 24:8), so she lives in Jerusalem (Sirach 24:11), where she is identified with “the book of the covenant of the Most High God, the law that Moses commanded us” (Sirach 24:23). This tradition was widespread, as one of the recently published Dead Sea Scrolls shows: “Happy is the man to whom she [Wisdom or Torah] has been given…God gave her to Israel, and with good measure He measures her out, and all his people he will redeem and he will slay those who hate his wisdom…Seek her and find her and hold fast to her and get her as an inheritance. With her is length of days and fatness of bone and joy of heart” (4Q185 2.8–12). In all these sources, wisdom becomes coextensive with God and Israel’s Torah and biblical tradition.

The Wisdom of Solomon attributes to wisdom God’s care for Israel throughout biblical history (Wisdom of Solomon 10–19). Written in Greek in the first century B.C.E. or C.E., the work describes wisdom through florid Greek metaphors and adjectives (7:22–8:1): “There is in [wisdom] a spirit that is intelligent, holy, unique, manifold, subtle, mobile, clear, unpolluted, distinct, invulnerable, loving the good, keen, irresistible, beneficent, human, steadfast, sure, free from anxiety, all-powerful, overseeing all, and penetrating through all spirits that are intelligent, pure and altogether subtle. For wisdom is more mobile than any motion; because of her pureness she pervades and penetrates all things. For she is a breath of the power of God and a pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty…” (Wisdom of Solomon 7:22–25). Wisdom represents everything the Greek and Jewish traditions value, from intelligence and holiness to spirituality and virtue.

The New Testament draws heavily upon the wisdom tradition. The introductory hymn to the Gospel of John (John 1:1–18) identifies Jesus as the “Word of God” using language and imagery associated with the biblical wisdom tradition. The word, just like wisdom, worked with God on creation (John 1:3–4, 10), and like wisdom in Sirach, the word came into the world (John 1:10–11, 14). In the end, the word, wisdom and Jesus function as the accurate communication of God’s knowledge and will. In a very different way, the Gospel of Luke stresses Jesus’ God-given wisdom even as a child: “The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him…And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favor” (Luke 2:40, 52). The Gospel of Matthew, too, implicitly identifies Jesus with wisdom (“Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds” [Matthew 11:19]) and with direct communication with God (“No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” [Matthew 11:27]).

With all this emphasis on wisdom, what kind of teachings and themes appear in the proverbs, maxims and exhortations found in the psalms, prophets, narratives, apocalyptic books, testaments, gospels and letters of the Bible and of nonbiblical Jewish and Christian literature? A few examples must suffice. Ancient concern about the 053effects of speech corresponds to contemporary anxieties about the corrosive effects of social conflict and misleading advertising in the media. Numerous ancient proverbs highlight the dangers of speech and anger: “A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger” (Proverbs 15:1); and “A fool gives full vent to anger, but the wise quietly holds it back” (Proverbs 29:11).

On the other hand, wise and prudent speech can repair social breaches and reconstruct society: “With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue can break bones” (Proverbs 25:15); “Pleasant speech multiplies friends, and a gracious tongue multiplies courtesies” (Sirach 6:5).

The Letter of James stresses the destructive role of the untamed tongue: “The tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits. How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell…. But no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison” (James 3:5–8).

The tongue expresses anger, hostility and hate, all of which tear the human community apart. Jesus and Paul both advise against seeking vengeance against one’s enemies (Matthew 5:38–47; Romans 12:19), and Paul supports his case by quoting from Proverbs: “If your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads” (Romans 12:20; see Proverbs 25:21–22). In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus warns more generally that “if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment” (Matthew 5:22).

True wisdom, which produces wise speech, comes from God. “If you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first of all pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy” (James 3:14–17). In the beatitudes, Jesus praises the merciful, pure of heart and peacemakers (Matthew 5:9), who are also praised in beatitudes found at Qumran (4Q525):

Happy is the one who speaks truth with a pure heart
and does not slander with his tongue.
Happy are they who cling to [wisdom’s] statutes
and do not cling to ways of iniquity.
Happy are they who rejoice in her
and do not babble in the ways of iniquity.
Happy are they who seek her with pure hands
and do not search for her with a deceitful heart.
Happy is the man (who) has attained wisdom
and walks by the Law of the Most High,
and fixes his heart on her ways…¹

God who gives divine wisdom to humans is very much a God of this world in these proverbs, instructions, warnings and exhortations. The wisdom that lives with Israel in Sirach and the wisdom brought by Jesus in the New Testament actively repair and construct the social-political relationships that hold a community together. Though contemporary Western culture tends to separate religion from civil society and the practicalities of everyday life, the biblical tradition insists that human activity, thought, discipline and behavior are integrally connected to and as important as explicitly “religious” concerns such as faith, covenant, Torah and salvation.

If you were asked to tell someone about the Bible, you would not begin with the Book of Proverbs. The stories of the Creation and the Garden of Eden and of Abraham and the Exodus attract us with their drama and depth. The heroism and struggles of Saul and David and the wisdom and generosity of Jesus captivate our imaginations. The covenants, commandments and prophecies of the Hebrew Bible and the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament draw our attention and call for our assent. Against the grandeur of these narratives, the homely proverbs, warnings and exhortations of […]