Wisdom a she?

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Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
 
Well, I don’t know if it’s relevant, but in Greek if I’m not mistaken, wisdom is in the feminine, sophia, so it’s understood that wisdom is in the feminine gender.
 
katy said:
Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
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Wisdom was of such value to the writers of the OT that they personified it as a nurturing and protective mother. They saw that wisdom was eternal, proceeding from the mouth of the Most High. It was only at the coming of the Son of God in the Incarnation that Holy Wisdom (Sophia) reaches its fullest expression in the Word made Flesh. This is why, e.g., we see Our Lord urging all to “come to me, all you who are heavy laden. . .” - like that nurturing mother of the sapiential writers of the OT, and why St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 1:24-30, teaches clearly of “Christ, the wisdom of God.” (Thus Our Lady has the title “Seat of Wisdom”). Hagia Sophia (ayasofia), the great Byzantine basilica of Constantinople (sadly, now a mosque) was named in honor of Christ and not in honor of a goddess. 🙂
 
You’ll find that Holy Wisdom is personified in the feminine not just in the book of Wisdom, but also in the book of Proverbs - which is securely in the Protestant canon.

Proverbs 1. 20-33, Ch 2 and 3 etc.

So it’s not just a deuterocanonical event.

The theology of this has not been deeply explored. Some of the Wisdom passages are ascribed as Jesus, others not.
 
katy said:
Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
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  1. The root of wisdom – to whom has it been revealed? Her clever devices – who knows them?
  2. There is One who is wise, greatly to be feared, sitting upon his throne.
  3. The Lord himself created wisdom; he saw her and apportioned her, he poured her out upon all his works.
  4. She dwells with all flesh according to his gift, and he supplied her to those who love him.
Ecclesiasticus
 
katy said:
Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
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This is not purely a feature of the deuterocanonicals. Try the early chapters of the book of Proverbs–particularly chap. 8, I believe.

Perhaps your identification of this language with “New Age” is poorly informed and needs to be reevaluated? Indeed, I question whether the term “New Age” is of much use–it can mean a lot of things, and I don’t think it’s wise to use it (or any other general label) as a “smear term” to dismiss ideas irrespective of their intrinsic merit.

Edwin
 
Milliardo said:
Well, I don’t know if it’s relevant, but in Greek if I’m not mistaken, wisdom is in the feminine, sophia, so it’s understood that wisdom is in the feminine gender.
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Exactly; the grammatical femininity of the word for “wisdom” was expanded into personification as feminine.

FWIW, the corresponding Hebrew word, “khokhma,” is also feminine.
 
Oh, wow, why was the Book of Wisdom taken out? This morning before school I was reading about Idolatry. And it was amazing, I mean, it clearly showed what idol worshiping really is. If only a Protestant read they would/should see how they’ve misinterpreted Catholic teaching and the reason why our 10 Commandments differ from “theirs”.
 
When you look throughout the book of Wisdom you will notice that the author, who is not written by King Solomon but an Alexandrian Jew with great reference to King Solomon, equates wisdom to a bride especially in Ch. 7 & 8 where he says, "I loved her and sought her from my youth, and I desired to take her for my bride, and I became enamored of her beauty (Wis. 8:2). Wisdom is something to be desired like the most beautiful bride and to join in union with her means to be united to God. Consider also how this equates to the same references to the Church for which we use the feminine pronoun.
 
Wisdom is refer as She. think about it. maybe offend to some.

rule over earth ADAM

first created ADAM
EVE tooked out of ADAM so called as WO MAN

GOD as Male he

woman, knowledge, nature, soft gentle love,caring female side

she in possion of YOUR body.
YOU decide what path to take. not wise . you direact wisdom, act on wisdom of words etc.

God in wisdom choose to be good caring as God he is! female trait (she caring. he to take care, protect for her)

today that she can be noted as people genrally write grammers. she is doomed (Isreal) she the nation going to fall.Goverments never noted as she the ones who control counties

is she doomed? never heard said refer nations as he

same people called boats genrally names Jenny, Mary etc female names. always she in possion or under control or direact from someone. since she female soft gentle caring mother baring undomaiting etc. same reason bible often use the evil of sins bad wisdom a nation evil, or person etc use parable or as refer like a harolt woman gitter with rubies dimaiods. lust men afar entrap them often in old testment. get the idea some body obvious reasons but spiritually man is to take wisdom of she begin caring as well not all male domianting in strenght.

gill
 
Great insights and kudos to my Brothers and Sisters in Christ. All of you are right on the mark, so I have really nothing to add theologically. The only thing I would like to add concerning Divine Wisdom - Sophia is a 19th century author who wrote about this topic. He is a bit difficult to understand as he tries to articulate the mystical, but a good read nonetheless. His name is Vladimir Soloviev. There are some things on the internet, but as is the case with mystics, new agers claim things that do not really belong to them. So, if you do look him up, see who the author is first…many Russian authors have written about him and are balanced, but there is some New Age material out there concerning him. Be discerning…and focused on Jesus…
 
katy said:
Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
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Not a goddess, but an hypostasis - that is, an attribute personified & treated as an individual. Hypostasisation of qualities is familiar from Israel’s neighbours, & there are other examples of this in the OT; as with Righteousness & Peace in (IIRC), Psalm 85.​

In Ecclesiasticus 24, Wisdom is identified with the Torah - which is quite close to Muslim doctrine regarding the Koran.
 
katy said:
Being somewhat new to Catholic scripture reading, I am just starting to read the books they don’t tell you about as a Protestant.😉 I decided to tackle Wisdom. It sounds as tho the author is speaking about God, but refers to Wisdom as a She. I know the writer is not a current New Ager, but that’s how it sounds to me. God as Goddess and all that. I know that’s way off base, but I still don’t understand this.
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Hi Katy, wisdom is also spoken of in Proverbs 8 and is a she there too. Basically, Wisdom is simply an attribute of God, nothing more.
 
In speaking of God it is heretical to confine the concept to either male or female. God is both male a female and neither male nor female. When talking about a “pure spirit” it is impossible to speak without saying something which is either incorrect or misleading. It is the nature of symbols and language which is the limiting factor. We are simply stuck with the fact that virtually anything we say regarding God is wrong in some way because language fails us.
Yes, God is Lady Wisdom. It’s scriptural. It’s also good Hebrew.

Matthew
 
Hi Katy,

As said above, the Greek word for wisdom, sophia, is feminine. The original language for this book of the Bible is Greek.

Verbum
 
Verbum said:
Hi Katy,

As said above, the Greek word for wisdom, sophia, is feminine. The original language for this book of the Bible is Greek.

Verbum
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So, as with other languages with gendered nouns, the pronouns would need to correspond to the gender of the noun as a word. For instance, in Latin star is stella, which is feminine, so the pronoun would have to be feminine also even tho a star is neither male nor female.
 
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