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From: Wisdom 7:7-11

Solomon opts for wisdom

[7] Therefore I prayed, and understanding was given me;
I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came to me.
[8] I preferred her to scepters and thrones,
and I accounted wealth as nothing in comparison with her.
[9] Neither did I liken to her any priceless gem,
because all gold is but a little sand in her sight,
and silver will be accounted as clay before her.
[10] I loved her more than health and beauty,
and I chose to have her rather than light,
because her radiance never ceases.
[11] All good things came to me along with her,
and in her hands uncounted wealth.

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Commentary:

7:7-21. In Old Testament tradition, Solomon was seen as the epitome of the
wise man; but he was not born wise. As he says, he prayed and pleaded for it
(v. 7; cf. later chap. 8 and also 1 Kings 3:5ff; 5:9ff). And he put wisdom first —
before sceptres and thrones, precious stones, gold and silver, health and beauty;
even before the light of the sun (vv. 8-10). Because it was wisdom that he asked
for and not other things, God added them on top of his gift of wisdom (v. 11 ).
These verses and v. 14 will remind Christian readers of what our Lord says in the
sermon on the mount when he exhorts us to seek first the Kingdom of God and
his righteousness, and the rest will be added on (cf. Mt 6:25-33).

A familiar theme in wisdom writings is the superiority of spiritual things over ma-
terial things. In this passage ten comparisons make just that point: wisdom is
better than everything, even bodily health (cf. Sir 30:14-16). There is a strict pa-
rallelism in the passage, sometimes alternating “she” (wisdom) with the other
terms of comparison (”wealth”, “priceless gem”, “all gold” and “silver”). It is very
likely that there is an echo here of the views of the Stoics, who said that happi-
ness was the only virtue, above everything else, so therefore the wise man
should he ‘’imperturbable” (stoical), indifferent towards everything, good or evil.
But what this passage really has to do with is the notion, seen in earlier Jewish
wisdom writing, that neither gold nor any thing else for that matter can compare
with wisdom (cf. Job 28:15-19; Prov 3:14; 4-7); or that she is sweeter than honey,
more precious than any pearl or gem (cf. Ps 19:10; 119:72, 127; Prov 3:14-15;
8:11, 19; 16:16).

Having wisdom means, in the first place, letting oneself be guided by God and
being conscious that he holds man’s life in his hands. But wisdom also includes
understanding the world around us — the sort of “encyclopedic wisdom” held in
such high esteem in the ancient world and in the Bible (cf. 1 Kings 5:13-14). This
is because the visible world constitutes an harmonious whole, devised by divine
Wisdom, which provides man with instruction in everything from practical skills to
cosmology and the “elements”, “stoicheia” (v. 17), a term taken from Greek phi-
losophy and which was in common use in educated circles in the Hellenic world.
Still, “what is distinctive in the biblical text is the conviction that there is a pro-
found and indissoluble unity between the knowledge of reason and the knowledge
of faith. The world and all that happens within it, including history and the fate of
peoples, are realities to he observed, analyzed and assessed with all the resour-
ces of reason, but without faith ever being foreign to the process. Faith intervenes
not to abolish reason’s autonomy nor to reduce its scope for action, but solely to
bring the human being to understand that in these events it is the God of Israel
who acts” (Bl. John Paul II, “Fides et ratio”, 16).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.