Holy Wisdom and the Created Order—Lectionary Reflection for Trinity Sunday, C (Proverbs 8)
8 Does not wisdom call
and understanding raise her voice?
2 On the heights, beside the way,
at the crossroads she takes her stand;
3 beside the gates in front of the town,
at the entrance of the portals she cries out:
4 “To you, O people, I call,
and my cry is to all who live.
22 “The Lord created me at
the beginning of his work,
the first of his acts of long ago.
23 Ages ago I was set up,
at the first, before the beginning of the earth.
24 When there were no depths I was brought forth,
when there were no springs abounding with water.
25 Before the mountains had been shaped,
before the hills, I was brought forth,
26 when he had not yet made earth and fields
or the world’s first bits of soil.
27 When he established the heavens, I was there;
when he drew a circle on the face of the deep,
28 when he made firm the skies above,
when he established the fountains of the deep,
29 when he assigned to the sea its limit,
so that the waters might not transgress his command,
when he marked out the foundations of the earth,
30 then I was beside him, like a
master worker,
and I was daily his delight,
playing before him always,
31 playing in his inhabited world
and delighting in the human race.
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When it comes to the doctrine
itself and the way Christians name God, we might start by acknowledging that most
baptismal formulas draw from Matthew 28, such that we are baptized in the name
of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. However, “biblically speaking, things are a
bit tricky as we do not have a fully developed, explicit doctrine of the
Trinity. So, when it comes to the Revised Common Lectionary, finding scriptural
texts that speak to the doctrine of the Trinity is complicated. That is
especially true of Old Testament readings. While theologians have been adept at
finding hints of the Trinity in the Old Testament, there are few, if any,
direct references. It is also true that Judaism is strictly monotheistic, as is
also true of Islam. Thus, the readings tend to come from the Psalms or
Proverbs, with readings focusing on aspects of the divine nature or offering
praise to God. In Year C, the choices come from Proverbs 8 and Psalm 8. The
latter declares, “How majestic is your name.”
Here in Proverbs 8, we read about
the role Holy Wisdom plays in creation. Wisdom or Sophia (in Greek) is
often linked to the Holy Spirit, as well as to Jesus. The challenge here, as we
see in the reading, is that Holy Wisdom is the first of God’s creations, and
then through Wisdom, God creates all other things. So, is Wisdom a creation of
God, or does Wisdom proceed from the Father (if connected to the Holy Spirit),
or is Wisdom the “only begotten” if linked to the Son of God? These are not
questions that can be fully addressed in a Sunday morning sermon, but preachers
should keep these questions in mind as they prepare to preach.
Whether
the description of Wisdom in Proverbs 8 provides resources for a Trinitarian
theology is up for debate. That Wisdom is described using female descriptors is
one reason why this is turned to in attempts to delve into God’s triune
identity. If we start by affirming that when it comes to the Trinity, the three
persons of the Godhead are eternal and uncreated, then we can ask whether the
idea of Wisdom fits that doctrine. But we must acknowledge that in Proverbs
8:22, Wisdom is described as being the first act of divine creation. With this
in mind, we might hear this word from church historian Liza Anderson, who has
expertise in Eastern Christianity, including Origen, who points out that Arius
used Proverbs 8:22 when referencing the use of the concept of the Logos in
his effort to demonstrate that Christ is a created being. Anderson writes:
Given that subsequent ecumenical councils commit us to a belief that the Spirit is likewise uncreated, a simple identification of the biblical figure of Wisdom with any of the three Trinitarian Persons seems impossible to sustain. There are still all kinds of interesting things to do with that feminine personification of Wisdom; the Russian tradition of sophiology as expressed by Bulgakov and others offers examples. But there is no easy way to conflate it with the Holy Spirit that doesn’t simply result in subordinating the Spirit to the Father and the Son. [Liza Anderson, “Translating the Trinity,” Covenant (March 28, 2019).]
For his part, Sergius Bulgakov, the late Russian Orthodox
theologian mentioned above, connects Wisdom (Sophia) with the Logos
doctrine concerning the divinity of Christ. For Bulgakov, Sophia is the
essence of God revealed to creation. He writes:
The divine Sophia, as the revelation of the Logos, is the all-embracing unity which contains within itself all the fullness of the world of ideas. But to the creature also God the Creator entrusts this all, withholding nothing in himself and not limiting the creature in any way: ‘all things were made by him [the Word]’. In Sophia the fullness of the ideal forms contained in the Word is reflected in creation. [Sergius Bulgakov: A Bulgakov Anthology, p.154].
When we think of Wisdom (Sophia) in connection with
the Trinity, we must be careful. Nevertheless, passages like Proverbs 8 do
provide some resources for that conversation. Bulgakov is an important interpreter
of this tradition.
With
this introduction, we can turn to the reading itself, which draws from two
sections of the chapter. The first section, verses 1 to 4, describes Woman
Wisdom as something of a street preacher, who calls out to everyone willing to
listen to follow her guidance. Wisdom stands at the city gates, calling out to everyone
who comes and goes through the city gates, inviting them to follow her lead.
This invitation comes after a different kind of woman is described in Proverbs
7. In that chapter, we read of a “loose woman” who seeks to seduce a young man
to follow in her footsteps. Now, in chapter 8, we read of a different kind of
woman, one who offers a righteous and wise way of living.
Having
introduced Wisdom, we pick things up again in verse 22. In this and the following
verses, we learn that Wisdom is God’s first act of creation. Wisdom is created
before the beginning of the earth, before there were depths and springs filled
with water, before the mountains were shaped and the hills brought forth. Yes,
even before God laid out the fields and produced the first soil, Wisdom was
present. Indeed, Wisdom was present when God established the heavens and when
God established the sky above and the fountains of the deep. Yes, Wisdom
existed before God even began to create the earth. Wisdom was with God,
standing beside God, serving as a “master worker.” God delighted in Wisdom as
Wisdom rejoiced before God, celebrating the inhabited world and the human race.
The reference to Wisdom serving alongside God as a master worker reveals that
Wisdom plays a central role in the creative process. Without her, nothing comes
into being. Thus, we can see why Wisdom is connected not only to the Holy
Spirit but Christ also. Something similar is said in John 1 of the Logos—
“All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came
into being” (John
1:3).
The
message of this reading is one of Joy and celebration. Wisdom tells how she
participated with God in the creation of all things, delighting in it all,
including the creation of humanity. As we ponder this passage, with its
celebration of the goodness of God’s creation, we should hear a call to care
for this gift of God. It is important to be careful with how we make use of the
resources the Earth provides. We must take care of and preserve the grandeur of
the created order. At a time when our National Parks, Monuments, Forests, Sea
and Lakeshores, and nature preserves are being endangered by efforts on the
part of the U.S. government, this is a word that we should take to heart, even
as we celebrate the triune nature of God, who is the Creator, Redeemer, and
Sustainer of all things.
Trinity Sunday highlights God’s
fullness, however, we have come to understand that fullness. In celebrating
God’s fullness, we acknowledge God’s role as Creator. Knowing that God takes
delight in the creation, of which Holy Wisdom is both the first act and the
partner in the ongoing acts of creation, we can sing boldly: “All creatures of
our God and king, lift up your voice and with us sing; Alleluia, Alleluia!”
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