In this article I want to deal with the somewhat tenuous connection between Prov. 8:22-31 and three other passages, which has been asserted by some. These passages are Prov. 30:4, John 1:1, 1 Cor. 1:24 and 30. I will continue to use these abbreviations from the previous article: PISV = pre-incarnate son view; TV = Torah view; PAV = personified attribute view.
Appendix 1 – Proverb 30:4
This is the most surprising of the passages, for I had never encountered this assertion prior to my research for my previous article. In that research I read and listened to a number of presentations on Proverbs 8:22-31 from the PISV, and was stunned to see a few of them, both trinitarian and non-trinitarian, assert a connection between the two passages. Here is the passage:
Who has ascended into heaven, and then descended? Who has gathered up the wind in the palm of his hand ? Who has bound up the waters in a cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is his son’s name? Surely you know!
The assumed point of connection with Prov. 8:22-31 is that this verse supposedly confirms the interpretation of that passage as being about the pre-incarnate son. Though the previous passage is somewhat ambiguous, veiling the pre-incarnate son under the figure of Wisdom, this verse supposedly reveals that wisdom, in the previous passage, is in reality God’s son, who was with him and participated in the creation event. But this supposed connection depends on three things that are assumed by the proponents of PISV but not substantiated from the text itself – 1. that the answer to all of the “who” questions is God, 2. that the answer to the question “What is his name?” is Yahweh, and 3. that in the question “What is his son’s name?” the son refers to an ontological son of God who was either eternally begotten or produced out of the Father’s substance just prior to creation. A fourth assumption is that the first four questions have to do with who created the world. Let’s see if any of these assumptions proves true.
The first thing to point out is that these questions are almost certainly to be understood as rhetorical, and that the real answer to the first four is no one, and so the answer to the other two are then cancelled out because a name cannot be assigned to no one and a son cannot be attributed to no one. In other words, these questions are not really designed to elicit a serious answer. Now let’s think about this. If, as assumed, the first four questions are concerned with who created the world, do we really think that one Jew, Agur, would really have to query two other Jews, Ithiel and Ukal, as to who created the world? The very thought is laughable! Every ancient Jew knew who created the world. This makes this view suspicious from the start. It is not even certain that the creation of the world is what is in view in these four questions. Certainly the first question – “Who has ascended in to heaven and descended?” – would have nothing to do with God creating the world. The second and third questions – “Who has gathered up the wind in the palm of his hand ?” and “Who has bound up the waters in a cloak?” seem to speak more about the manipulation or control of the wind and the waters than about the creation of them. Even the last question, which is ambiguous in both it’s translation and precise meaning, is probably not referring to the act of creation either. What exactly does the phrase “ends of the earth” refer to? Sometimes it refers to distant nations or lands; sometimes it refers to all the people of the world; sometimes it refers to the extreme borders of the land of Israel. What does the word qum in the Hiphil stem mean? The verse could be translated as “Who established all the ends of the earth?” and could possibly be referring to the creation of the world, but I could find no other place where the word qum is used in that way; this verse would be a one off usage of qum with that meaning. It could mean “who has established all the nations” and would then have reference to what Paul said in Acts 17:26: “From one man He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their lands.”
At any rate, I think the best way to understand these questions is as rhetorical. The real force of the first four questions is “What man has done or can do these things?” and the answer is none.1 Now, we could say that certainly God can do all of the things proposed in the questions, but I don’t think that is the point. Rather, the point seems to be that it is impossible for man to do these things. Although vv. 1-3 are ambiguous, they might hold the key to understanding v. 4. Agur is said to have declared this utterance to Ithiel and Ukal. Perhaps these two men had asserted a superior wisdom to that of Agur and he spoke in this way to them to humble them. The final clause, “If you know,” which could be taken as “If you are so wise,” certainly has a sarcastic ring to it. Perhaps the idea is that the wisdom Ithiel and Ukal claimed for themselves is as impossible for man to obtain as it is impossible to accomplish these four feats. Verses 2-3 seem to fit this view of the passage, in that Agur seems to be exaggerating his own lack of wisdom and knowledge in comparison to that of Ithiel and Ukal.
It is also worth noting the first question, which speaks of first ascending to heaven and then descending. This does not seem like something that would be said of God. We might perhaps imagine a scenario where God first descends to earth and then ascends back to heaven, but if the ascent is first, then the starting place would be earth and so the more reasonable conclusion would be that this refers to a man ascending to heaven and then back2. This first question may set the tone for the questions that follow, the idea being that any man who could achieve this first feat could go on to accomplish the other feats. In any case, the whole point of the passage seems to be to underscore the limitations of man in attaining a complete knowledge and understanding of God and his ways.
So for Agur to ask, “What is his name,” is simply a rhetorical devise. Ithiel and Ukal cannot supply a name, for no man exists who can accomplish these feats. And to ask for the name of his son is simply to ask for further information to make a certain identification of the man who has done these things (wink wink).
But let us suppose, for the sake of the argument, that Agur’s four questions were meant to elicit the answer God, and “What is his name” was meant to exact the answer Yahweh. Why should we assume that the question “what is his son’s name” would be referring to an ontological son of God who was either eternally begotten or produced out of the Father’s substance just prior to creation? Such a theological concept did not even exist at the time Proverbs was written. Why should we import a much later theological development back into this ancient text? If the answer to the questions is God, and his name is Yahweh, then, within the cultural and historical context of the passage, there would be at least two much more plausible answers to the question “what is his son’s name.” First, it might be answered Israel, for the nation of Israel was regarded by Yahweh as his son3. But an even more probable answer would have been Solomon, for in the cultural milieu in which the Proverbs was written, the king of any given nation was regarded as the son of the god on whose behalf he reigned. This was also true of Yahweh and the king whom he chose to rule for him over his people. We see this ancient Near East concept reflected in the words of God to king David in 1 Chron. 28:5-6:
“Of all my sons—and the Lord has given me many—he has chosen my son Solomon to sit on the throne of the kingdom of the Lord over Israel. 6 He said to me: ‘Solomon your son is the one who will build my house and my courts, for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father.’ “4
Therefore, there is no good reason to see this passage as having any connection with Proverb 8:22-31 or as confirming the PISV of it.
Appendix 2 – John 1:1
A connection between Prov. 8:22-31 and John 1:1 has been posited ever since the second half of the 2nd century. Early church fathers (ECF) so-called, who held the PISV, maintained that the two passages refer to the same thing, i.e. the pre-incarnate son being with God prior to the creation of the world. Indeed, these ECF assumed that John had Prov. 8:22-31 in mind when he wrote this opening verse of his gospel, as do modern proponents of the PISV. Some proponents of the PAV also assume that John wrote his prologue with Prov. 8 in mind. They see much similarity between John 1:1 and wisdom literature in general, especially with passages in the books of Sirach, Baruch and Wisdom of Solomon. Hence they speak of the author of John employing a wisdom motif in the prologue and insist that it should be read in light of this wisdom motif. Proponents of the TV, who hold wisdom and word to be synonymous and as referring to the Torah, would certainly want to read John 1:1 as “In the beginning was the Torah, and the Torah was with God, and the Torah was divine.”
As for me, I don’t see any reason to assume a connection between the two passages, except for the use of personification in both; in the one, of the attribute of wisdom, in the other, of God’s word. While wisdom and word may be able to be equated on some level, wisdom does not exhaust the meaning of what God’s word is. Wisdom is only one aspect of what word might denote, because although it contains wisdom, there are other facets to God’s word, such as promises, prophetic utterances and decrees. What if the author of John wanted to express some aspect of God’s word other than wisdom? In some instances wisdom would not be appropriate to express a particular aspect of God’s word. For example, in the Wisdom of Solomon 18:15, in his recounting of the plague on the first-born of Egypt, the author does not personify wisdom, but God’s decree of judgment, speaking of his “allpowerful word [which] leaped down from heaven out of [his] royal throne as a fierce warrior into a land of destruction.” It would not have been suitable for him to have spoken of wisdom in this manner, so he chose instead to use word, which encompasses a wider range of meaning.
For this reason, along with the fact that neither the word wisdom nor the idea of wisdom is to be found anywhere in the prologue or even in the rest of the gospel of John, I don’t think the author had Prov. 8 in mind. As I interpret the prologue5, logos (word) is not meant to evoke wisdom but God’s prophetic word of promise. This prophetic promise, which was with God in the beginning, becomes, at a point in history, a reality in the real world in the human person Yeshua of Nazareth. The similarities between this passage and Prov. 8:22-31 are superficial, stemming first from the use of personification in both, and secondly from the use of creation language. But it is more likely that John modeled his prologue on Genesis 1, though only figuratively6, which would account for the language of creation. Similarities between this passage and intertestamental Jewish wisdom literature may be explained as the author using, or even borrowing, similar language but applying it in the context of God’s word of promise rather than of wisdom. Proponents of the PAV who insist that John’s prologue should be understood in terms of the wisdom of Prov. 8, are, in my view, playing into the hands of the PISV proponents.
Proponents of the PISV make the same mistake with John’s prologue that they do with the Prov. 8 passage, they miss the obvious use of personification and take it too literally. Just as they take wisdom to be an actual person who was with God before the creation of the world, so they take word to be also. This is not because either text demands this interpretation but because they approach both of these texts already with that presupposition in mind.
I don’t think the TV has any value in understanding John’s prologue because of v. 17, which reads, “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” The law, no doubt, refers to the Torah, and is associated with Moses, while grace and truth7 are associated with the coming of Yeshua the Messiah. This would seem to preclude the logos, which becomes embodied in the man Yeshua of Nazareth, from being equated with the Torah.
Appendix 3 – 1 Cor. 1:24 and 30
” . . . but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God . . . It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God, and also righteousness, sanctification and redemption.”
Since these two verses seem to equate Yeshua with wisdom, proponents of the PISV often assert that Paul had Prov. 8 in mind when he wrote them. But even some proponents of the PAV assert the same thing since they believe that Paul, in a number of his letters, presented the Messiah as the embodiment of wisdom. They speak of Paul and other NT authors as holding a wisdom Christology, i.e. seeing the role of Christ in terms of wisdom as portrayed in Prov. 8 and in other Jewish wisdom literature. But is this really what Paul had in mind when he wrote 1 Corinthians? The scant few words Paul says here should caution against taking an adamant posture.
In the context, Paul is speaking of the message of a crucified Messiah as being a stumbling block to Jews, who were waiting for a powerful king to deliver them from Gentile subjugation, and as being foolishness to Greeks, who highly valued philosophy. Jews demanded signs of power to authenticate a messianic claim, and Greeks demanded wisdom, i.e. a message had to be congruent with the then prevalent philosophies. Paul is saying in v. 24 that for those who have believed the message, whether Jew or Greek, Messiah is the power and wisdom of God. But does he mean by this that the person of Messiah is identical to God’s wisdom and power, that to speak of God’s wisdom just is to speak of Messiah? I do not think this is what Paul means, first and foremost because without the presupposition that Messiah pre-existed with God before the creation it just doesn’t make sense. It is more probable that what Paul means is that the wisdom and power of God are best demonstrated in his eternal plan, which revolves around Messiah. Whereas, Jews typically would have considered the creation of the world as the greatest display of God’s wisdom and power, believers can now look to what God has planned and accomplished in Messiah as the greatest expression of his wisdom and power.8
As for the second statement, in v. 30, I would suggest it should be understood in the sense that Yeshua the Messiah has become, for us who believe, the means of attaining the wisdom of God, as well as the means of attaining righteousness, santification and redemption.
I just do not see any reason to think that Paul had Prov. 8 in mind when he wrote 1 Cor. 1, nor do I find it necessary to the understanding of this passage to suppose he was casting Messiah in the image of the personified wisdom of the Jewish intertestamental literature. The passage is comprehensible apart from the uncertain concept of wisdom christology.
Endnotes
- Another passage which shows the use of rhetorical questions which require the answer “no one” is Is. 40;12-14, where God himself questions his people in this manner. ↩︎
- See Deut. 30:12. ↩︎
- See Ex. 4:22 and Hosea 11:1. ↩︎
- See also Ps. 2 where God says to the king whom he set on Zion “You are my son.” ↩︎
- For a full explanation of my view of the prologue see this article here. ↩︎
- I believe the prologue of John is playing off of the creation language of Gen. 1 but that it is not about the Genesis creation. This may be because the author has the new creation in the Messiah in mind. ↩︎
- Grace and truth in the GOJ corresponds to the Hebrew words hesed and emeth. These two words are coupled together often in the Hebrew Bible and together express the idea that God will be faithful to show his covenant mercy and love to Israel in accordance with the promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob – see Micah 7:20. The coming of Messiah into the world was the ultimate expression of God’s hesed and emeth toward Israel – see Lk. 1:68-73. ↩︎
- See Eph. 3:10-11. ↩︎
Let the Truth Come Out 