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I am switching computers and my son helped me today.

Unfortunately he did not save my ping list to my old computer which I am still using until we get further programming — so this will be your ping!

(I knew I should have sent my ping list in an email — drats!)

From: Proverbs 8:22-31

Third discourse: Wisdom speaks again (continued)

[22] The Lord created me at the beginning of his work,
the first of his acts of old.
[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] before he had made the earth with its fields,
or the first of the dust of the world.
[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 workman;
and I was daily his delight,
rejoicing before him always,
[31] rejoicing in his inhabited world
and delighting in the sons of men.

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Commentary:

1-36 The first part of the book ends with this third, splendid poem in praise of
personified Wisdom. As in the first poem (1:20-33) Wisdom speaks in public, for
all to hear (vv. 1-3); her message is not meant for a privileged few; it is addressed
to everyone (vv. 32-36).

Wisdom has every reason to call for attention, for the tuition she offers is about
noble things, and highly useful; there is nothing twisted or false about it (vv. 4-
14). Interpersonal relations work well if wisdom is allowed to do her work; if kings
and magistrates seek her sincerely, she guides them to rule evenhandedly (vv.
15-21). But she also operates outside the sphere of human relationships; we see
her present when order was imposed on chaos, to form the universe as we know
it; from the very start she was there with God (vv. 22-31).

This poem, with its solemn language, and imagery taken from traditional Israe-
lite cosmogony, shows the relationship between wisdom and the creation of the
world and of man. Wisdom is present with God at the creation and what delights
her most is her relationship with mankind. Here she is depicted as having the
features of a person: this prepares the way for us to grasp, later on, as Revela-
tion progresses, the mystery of the Blessed Trinity.

The prologue of the Gospel of St John will use language similar to that used here
to describe the relationship between God and the Word (vv. 22-30, cf. Jn 1:1; v.
35, cf. Jn 1:4). The status held by Wisdom in this poem will be attributed to
Christ in New Testament texts: in the Letter to the Colossians he is described
as “the first-born of all creation” (Col 1:15) and in the book of Revelation as “the
beginning of God’s creation” (Rev. 3:14). It is with this meaning that the Church’s
liturgy uses Proverbs 8:22-31 on the solemnity of Trinity Sunday (cycle C).

From the sixth century onwards, this passage appears in the Mass of the Birth
of Mary (8 September) – showing that the Church recognizes that, just as the
Word is God for all eternity, and is active in the creation of the world, the Mother
of the Saviour must have been in some way present in the mind of God “at the
beginning” (vv. 22-23). “Mary, the all-holy ever-virgin Mother of God, is the mas-
terwork of the mission of the Son and the Spirit in the fullness of time. For the
first time in the plan of salvation and because his Spirit had prepared her, the
Father found the dwelling-place where his Son and his Spirit could dwell among
men. In this sense the Church’s Tradition has often read the most beautiful texts
on wisdom in relation to Mary (cf. Prov 8:1-9:6; Sir 24). Mary is acclaimed and
represented in the liturgy as the “Seat of Wisdom” (Catechism of the Catholic
Church, 721).

*********************************************************************************************
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.

I finally got a copy of my ping list back to my old computer.

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