Alright, now that prayer is done, let's start lesson five. It's entitled in praise of wisdom, and that's going to be chapter 24 verse 1, all the way through 37 verse 17. We're going to stop right in the middle of chapter 37. And this section begins with a lot of commentaries called the second half of the book, and it begins with this incredible poem on wisdom.
We've been studying multiple poems on wisdom going back to chapter 1. There's been four poems, and this one is like the great crescendo, like the grand finale of a fireworks show or something like that. It's just truly amazing. And that's chapter 24.
And then as always, as I've explained before, Cirec always alternates between poems on wisdom. It then great long sections of wisdom applied or practical wisdom, and that's certainly going to be the case here. But we'll probably spend half of our time to ever take just on chapter 24 on this poem. It's called in praise of wisdom, which is why I entitled this lesson in praise of wisdom.
It is just truly great. We have a lot to talk about there, especially as it parallels a lot of the book of Proverbs, chapter 8. Then afterwards, we'll go over some of the great highlights of the practical wisdom. It's just straightforward, good stuff, common sense type of things that unfortunately, too many people don't have much of anymore.
So we'll look at that highlight of that as well. So let's begin here in chapter 24 verse 1. So like I said, all the poems build up to this great poem here. And actually, if you consider that this is the halfway part of the book, chapter 24, with this great climactic poem in the middle of it, that really is echoing Job.
I just want to point this out really quickly here before I move on. Job is of course a great book all about the Theodice, the mystic, the mystery of evil, of jog-dod's justice, and why does evil happen in the world, even to righteous people? But the very middle of the book of Job, I mean, you can consult my Bible study on that if you care to. Chapter 28 is also a great climactic poem on wisdom in the middle of Job.
And the great crescendo of that chapter is the fear of the Lord as the beginning of wisdom. That line, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom, or variations of that line is a telltale sign, a mark of the wisdom literature. It's in the Psalms, it's in Job, it's in all seven of the wisdom literature books. And of course, as you know, fear of the Lord is like the gigantic name of this book.
So anyways, just want to draw the interesting tidbit for you. Job got wisdom in the center of the book, so too does the book of Cirac has this poem on wisdom and is much longer than the previous poems that we've seen. So there are really three parts to this poem, really briefly versus one and two, it's kind of like an introduction to wisdom who's personified and who will praise herself and glory in God. And then there are three parts.
One is when she is speaking about her origins and her special role amongst men, especially God's people, Israel. And then part two is her invitation to all who want to dine with her and dine on her. And then part three is Ben Cirac seems to be very clearly Ben Cirac's reflections and commentary on wisdom speech. So good stuff.
And I want to take each of these parts one at a time. So briefly, let's just read chapter 24 versus one through two and look at this introduction to personified wisdom. She says 24 verse one wisdom will praise herself and is honored in God. She will glory in the midst of her people in the assembly of the most high she will open her mouth and in the presence of his host she will glory in the midst of her people she is exalted and in holy fullness she is admired in the multitude of the chosen she finds praise and among the blessed she is blessed saying and that begins part one.
So this is a pretty pretty kind of my way to introduce this great speech of wisdom personified. Remember she's personified as a woman just to remind you Hohma in Hebrew, Sophia in Greek is a feminine noun so wisdom is always a woman. She's a mother who cares for her children. She is a bride who loves her, her lover, her husband.
And so she's speaking here and the first person but it's pretty incredible that if she's going to speak and glorify herself among her people which is God's people and God's assembly and God's blessed and God's chosen and God's heavenly host pretty much covers every category here so far as I can tell them. In other words, she's going to be praising glory glorified everywhere. All right as coming from God going back to God as we saw in previous poems, wisdom is the end all be all of everything. The source, the summit, the fullness, the root, the crown of the Lord.
So she can develop this idea now. So she was in his everywhere. She's going to glorify it everywhere and now she speaks. So let me, this is a bit of a long section here.
Chapter 24 verses 3 through 17. There's a lot of parallels with Proverbs chapter 8 specifically 22 through the beginning of chapter 9. I'm not going to read that whole section to you, that would just be too long in tedious but I encourage you as we study this poem if Sierra 24 go back and read Proverbs chapter 8 verse 22 and following and you're going to find a lot of similarities there and I'll probably quote a couple things here and there as I go along. But let me read verse 13 through 17 here.
It says, and she's speaking the first person singular because she's personified, lady wisdom. I came forth from the mouth of the most high, the firstborn before all creatures. I ordained that an unfailing light should arise in the heavens and I covered the earth like a mist. I dwelt in high places and my throne was in a pillar of cloud.
Alone I have made the circuit of the vault of heaven and I have walked in the depths of the abyss. In the waves of the sea and the whole earth and in every people and nation I have gotten a possession. Among all these I sought a resting place. I sought in whose territory I might lodge.
Then the creator of all things gave me a commandment and the one who created me assigned a place for my tent or my tabernacle and he said, make your dwelling in Jacob and an Israel receive your inheritance. And among my chosen put down your roots. From eternity in the beginning he created me and for eternity I shall not cease to exist. In the holy tabernacle I ministered before him and so I was established in Zion.
In the beloved city likewise he gave me a resting place and in Jerusalem was my dominion. So I took root and an honored people in the portion of the Lord who is their inheritance and my abode was in the full assembly of the saints. I grew tall like a cedar in Lebanon and like a cypress on the heights of Herman. I grew tall like a palm tree in the Engedi and rose plants in Jericho, like a beautiful olive tree in the field and like a plain tree I grew tall and like cash on a camel's door and gave forth aroma of spices and like choice and murray spread a pleasant odor and like a Galbanum and Unca and Stakke and like the fragrance of frankincense in the tabernacle.
Like a terrible they spread out my branches and my branches are glorious and graceful. Like a vine I caused loveliness to bud and my blossoms became glorious and abundant fruit. Alright that's the end of part one where wisdom is speaking. Again of her origins in creation before creation.
Origins in God really and then her ultimately taking her abode and tabernacle amongst God's people and bearing great fruit and then using all of his horticulture imagery. Right so this is really incredible stuff especially as I've edited through from various commentaries some of the the real choice connections here of what's going on in this poem with really sanctification, redemption and ultimately a return to paradise, the garden of Eden through worship of God. That's really what's going on here just kind of you know steal the thunder a little bit and have spoiler alert that's what's happening as we're returning to God and returning to paradise through wisdom. So let's see how that plays out actually.
So all right number one in your notes go to go back to verse three just to refresh her memory here because I read the whole section for you. In verse three she talks first about how she comes forth from the mouth of the most high and she's the firstborn before all creatures. I do want to point out really quickly that if you go back to chapter one there's very similar language in all of this that was the very first poem of this book. Let's just go back to Cérac chapter one.
The prologue doesn't count remember that's just a prologue. In Cérac chapter one verse four and following she says some very similar stuff. It says wisdom was created while this is a poem about wisdom here in chapter 24 she's speaking about herself remember but still wisdom was created before all things and prudent understanding from eternity. The source of wisdom is word in the highest heaven.
Her ways are the eternal commandments. The root of wisdom to whom has been revealed. Her clever devices who knows them the knowledge of wisdom to whom was manifested etcetera. Verse nine the Lord himself created wisdom in the Holy Spirit.
He saw her and apportioned her. He poured her out upon his works. She dwells with all flesh according to his gift and he supplied her to those who love him. All right so you can see there's a lot of repetition and that's what I mean all these previous poems kind of build up and crescendo in this poem and this poem echoes a lot of the themes from previous poems and that's no surprise there.
So as we see going coming back to 24th three she came forth from the mouth of God and she's the firstborn before all creatures. There's a few things to say here. All right now remember as we talked about in lesson two when we first introduced Cirac chapters one and following I explained quoting the kind of commentary on scripture and other sources especially St. Thomas Aquinas that wisdom can be understood in different ways.
It's very important it's not all the same way they're very you got a distinguishing order to unite as St. Thomas would say. So wisdom can be understood as number one uncreated divine wisdom which of course is God right uncreated divine wisdom is God and so you find in Proverbs and wisdom and Cirac and all these other books when we're talking about wisdom the description of wisdom her attributes characteristics and whatnot her or divine origins is very much a type of Jesus Christ wisdom incarnate or the Holy Spirit as well and so it's always a both and because God the Father Son Holy Spirit all three persons possess the perfections of the Godhead without any distinction so it's not really a problem to say that the wisdom can be a type of uncreated divinity in the spirit and in the sun right that's not a problem. So on the one hand guess wisdom can be understood as uncreated divine wisdom which of course is Jesus and the Holy Spirit and God the Father as well but also created wisdom which is the gift of it's a gift of virtue and created wisdom itself can be understood as both natural where human beings through study and hard work and just work in the brain and they could figure out a little bit about how life works you know Aristotle for example is a great example of just having wisdom and understanding the Nicomachean Ethics just pops to my mind that's a good example of you know trying to find virtue in the world that we live in but this created wisdom this virtue is also a supernatural gift of the Holy Spirit so it's very important to keep that in mind in reading all the wisdom literature books that wisdom is both uncreated divine wisdom but it's also created wisdom which is a virtue or a gift and it's kind of it's kind of difficult a little bit I think at least for me I'll just speak for myself because when you're reading this sometimes it can be both right sometimes when you're reading about wisdom we're clearly talking uncreated wisdom the divinity of Jesus or the Holy Spirit sometimes it's a virtue that is given to God's saints and God's people sometimes it's a bit of both honestly and there's never any contradiction in these things because scripture is so polyvalent it has so many different layers of meaning you can find a lot of richness and a lot of fruits in looking at wisdom in both ways both uncreated as well as created so I really hope that brief review helps you there so in terms of uncreated divine wisdom if she says I came forth from the mouth of the most high and she's the firstborn of all creatures this typologically is referring to Jesus Christ all right because Jesus is the uncreated incarnate wisdom he is the word of God that comes forth from the mouth of God you see that in the original creation story itself when you see all three persons in Genesis chapter 1 and chapter 1 in the first few verses there in the opening of scripture because there's God the Father God the Holy Spirit is hovering the abyss the deep the waters of the deep but then when God speaks let there be light that word that God speaks the word that comes out of his mouth is the second person of the Trinity God the Son so when she says I came forth from the mouth of the most high this is referring to Jesus Christ uncreated incarnate wisdom he is the word of God like John says very very famously in the prologic was gospel in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God and he goes on to describe the involvement of the word with all of creation all of creation comes from the word is in the word etc okay so that's clearly Jesus Christ but this other line here the first born of creation Paul himself takes that line and applies it to Jesus in Colossians chapter 1 so in Colossians chapter 1 I'm going to flip there right now verse 15 and following it's all a Pauline commentary on really really very serious in these other wisdom books where he says Colossians chapter 1 verse 15 Jesus he is the image of the invisible God the firstborn of all creation for in him all things were created and heaven and on earth visible invisible where the thrones dominions principalities or authorities all things were created through him and for him he is before all things and in him all things hold together etc so his that little chunk of scripture there from Pauline Colossians 1 and elsewhere is where Paul is very clearly taking the scriptures of Cyrac and applying them to Jesus and as we continue to unpack Cyrac chapter 24 that will become more and more evident here so Jesus is the firstborn of all creatures it doesn't mean he is created that's the Aryan heresy that the church had to deal with it was a big problem in the early centuries this is another thing like if you compare Proverbs chapter 8 verse 22 it says almost the same thing let me read that as well here quickly Proverbs 8 22 it says the Lord created me at the beginning of his work the first of all of his acts of old well a lot of the scholars work a lot about this trying to understand what the words are used Aryan and the Aryan heresy said well this means Jesus is created he is before the world of created Jesus was created so he's not really God he's just the greatest of all of God's creations and that's not true at all because Jesus is like from light God from God right you know I mean so he's not created he is begotten of the Father and so there's a lot of good scholarship Proverbs 8 22 the word is not created it's Kanakh in Hebrew it's more begotten so there's probably a little more into the weeds than we need to go into but the idea here is still if you understand wisdom is created is a gift if it's uncreated and begotten then it is referring to Jesus Christ so he is the first of all creation begotten before all creations probably a better way to put that there okay very good so on the other hand if it is a gift and this is what one older commentary had pointed out here that it is also a gift for intellectual beings that would be specifically angels and humans sadly of course our pets do not receive supernatural gifts of wisdom it just all right so this is what the commentary says many explain this the uncreated wisdom born the womb of the blessed virgin in the church in our office does apply to her in the mystical sense so this commentary briefly interrupt here this comment here says yes it is true that you can read chapter 24 verse 3 and others applying to Jesus Christ but on the other hand it does seem to refer to the wisdom and grace granted to the saints which enlightens every man and presides over the creation in quotes so either way you look at it still makes sense and there's no contradiction whatsoever it can be referred both to uncreated as well as to create wisdom all right very good but we're gonna we're gonna roll with the uncreated idea here to the divinity because there's a lot of connections and that brings us to the next verse uh i actually continue in verse 3 i were dang that an unfailing light should arise in the heavens and i cover the earth like a mist i dwelled in the high places and my throne was in the pillar of cloud all right this these echoes or these references is also also seems to be to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit because if she brought forth light well when did god create light on the first day so as god's word wisdom brought forth light on the first day of creation and that's of course the word is Jesus Christ so there's another echo to Jesus there and when she covers the earth like a mist that seems to evoke commentaries will say the spirit of god covering the whole earth at creation right remember the ruach the spirit of god covered the the chaotic waters of the primordial creation there and then of course the pillar of cloud that we just read evokes god's presence in the shekina glory cloud that guided israel throughout the wilderness during her journeys so these few lions here these just couple of verses are referring to the divinity of godfather son holy spirit in different ways certainly god the son and god the holy spirit and it goes on here in verse uh five alone i have made the circuit of the vault of heaven and walk in the depths of the abyss and the waves of the sea and the whole earth so the point here is that wisdom is everywhere you can't get away from wisdom when god creates the heavens and the earth and the entire cosmos and universe wisdom is there you can't get away from her in the highest heavens and in a deep abyss of the oceans she is present in all of things and proverbs eight talks about that as well and even before in syrac back if you remember in chapter 16 we find god's wisdom being present in the creation of the world in the creation of man and especially god's wisdom sound of torah so wisdom is present everywhere in the visible universe and she even says here that she has a possession with those uh every people in every nation she's gotten a possession that is verse six i really like that a lot because if wisdom is present in all of god's creation then wisdom is accessible to all of humanity and all of the gentiles you can call them right all the nations all the people of the world that is what i see i haven't seen this in commentary but i think it's true that this would be a good verse about the accessibility of natural law or what you can call natural revelation you can know that god is one that god exists they have to follow god's law and worship him alone and love god and love neighbor that's all natural laws but the ten commandments essentially built into the spiritual DNA of every human being so wisdom is accessible to every people in every nation right that's true take a look at joeb joeb joeb if you remember that book and i did a bible study on that as well a joeb is a gentile he is the perennial example of the righteous gentile of the old testament to a great extent right he follows god's law he offers sacrifices as the priest the patriarchal priest of the family to atone for his and his sons and later on his his friends since he's a great gentile godfearing gentile because he follows wisdom because wisdom has a possession in this probably edemite joeb but having said all of that which is all over the whole world the heavens and the earth the earth the oceans and she has a possession amongst all peoples however she's still looking for a resting place a place to really abide in long long term so to speak and that's when in verse eight god gives her this commandment god god who created her as gift or maybe begotten i was going to read you all that and he says look make your dwelling in jacob and israel received your inheritance among my chosen put down your roots and that's where she's going to flourish and minister to god so this is this is a another movement here in wisdom being present all of creation and having possession of all peoples but it's especially god's people israel in the children of jacob where she's going to really flourish and have that inheritance she tabernacles in the city of jerusalem amongst god's people taking root there and resting there administering to god and so this is a really beautiful transition where it's it's ungod's people that she is going to enable god people to worship him and to be to return to him and so this whole idea of tabernacleing is in ministering to god is all about worship all right when she tabernacles there she's enabling the people of god to come back to god now this is what i would say really quickly about like supernatural divine revelation so if all peoples and all nations have access to her she has a possession among them that's in my mind i would apply the tennacher revelation like i said but now she has a special dwelling in israel where god reveals himself to his people in wisdom that's supernatural or what we call divine revelation hey this is dr neck thank you so much for listening to this course ample if you enjoyed it and want to listen to the entire lesson please become a student over at scripture and tradition dot com where you can listen to this entire course but also all the other courses that we have available in the snt audio library where you can listen to them on demand however and whenever you want so thank you so much god bless you and keep studying your bible