A Mother's Wisdom: The Virgin Mary in the Old Testament Wisdom Literature

The Immaculate Conception

Verse 25 ("nothing defiled gains entrance into her") affirms the doctrine of Mary's having been undefiled by sin, as cited by St. Thomas Aquinas in the Summa. ¹ This reinforces the previous point because it alludes to Mary's Immaculate Conception which was effected by the Holy Spirit with whom she is so close. Other phrases in the chapter which also relate to the Immaculate Conception are "unpolluted," "pure," and "spotless mirror." Wisdom 1:4, says Aquinas in the Summa, also communicates this idea: "...wisdom will not enter a deceitful soul, nor dwell in a body enslaved to sin." ²The Immaculate Conception, however, is perhaps most persuasively proven through the Ark of the Covenant as a type of Mary. For the Ark held within it the very presence of God, and could not be touched by sinful persons (Num. 4:20; 2 Sam. 6:6-7). So, too, Mary held within her the Incarnate Son of God, and was preserved from every stain of sin (Rev. 11:19-12:17). There are many more similarities between the Ark of the Covenant and Mary which can not be expounded in this current treatise.

The Assumption

If Mary was unsullied by sin, she also, therefore, was uncontaminated by sickness and infirmity, and ultimately untainted even by bodily corruption. Since the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23), these allusions must also point to the Assumption of Mary, as her body was incorruptible due to her sinlessness. Bouyer also notes this connection between the Assumption and Jewish wisdom theology.

At the final stage of a long process of elaboration in the religious thought of Israel, Wisdom becomes, as it were, raised up above the earth and carried up into God. But, even in God, it continues to be related to the creation, and, in particular, to the history of the people of God...So it is that, in Wisdom, it is always the creature we have to envisage, but the creature in God, the creature as God will realize it at the end of time, and as contained in his thought from all eternity. ³

Furthermore, Wisdom 7 is in the section of the book concerning how wisdom leads to everlasting life (chapters 6 to 9). ⁴ If Mary is Lady Wisdom, leading us to eternity with the Lord, then surely she must know the way herself. This is shown vividly in Wisdom 6:18-19 which reminds us that, "To observe her laws is the basis for incorruptibility; and incorruptibility makes one close to God." ⁵

The Perpetual Virginity

Wisdom being described as "invulnerable" (verse 22) is extremely similar to the title of Mary in the Litany of Loreto "Mother Inviolate," which can be a reference to her virginal integrity, which was preserved throughout both the conception and birth of Jesus. Another text which strongly correlates with and supports this idea is Wisdom 3:13b: "For blessed is the barren woman who is undefiled, who has not entered into a sinful union; she will have fruit when God examines souls" (see also Sir. 24:17, Prov. 8:19). This powerful verse not only resonates with traces of the Immaculate Conception, but also speaks of Mary's unique privilege of being a physically fruitful virgin, having the joys of both virginity and motherhood.

Verse 26 seems to point forward to Christ in Hebrews 1:3. However the idea that "she" is the "reflection, mirror, and image" of God is similar to an oft-repeated concept in Mariology: "Just as the moon is beautiful...by reflecting the sun's light, so is Mary beautiful and beneficial to us by reflecting the Light and Glory of Christ." ⁶

Friends of God

Verses 27 to 28 say that "...in every generation she passes into holy souls and makes them friends of God, and prophets; for God loves nothing so much as the man who lives with wisdom." Besides this passage's connection to the role of Mary as Mediatrix of all Graces, de Montfort proposes that since Mary has produced Jesus Christ, she will also form the greatest saints of all time, and that no one can be close to the Lord without an intimate relationship with Mary. ⁷ Indeed, "He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father." ⁸He further says that the reason the Holy Spirit does not do more wonders in souls is because He does not find Mary within them. ⁹The greatest, holiest, and most virtuous saints will have the greatest devotion to Our Lady, and they will draw the whole world into that devotion with them. They will have many struggles and enemies, but also a great many victories. ¹⁰These souls, seeking only God's glory and the salvation of souls, will be "true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, [and] charity." ¹¹They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come. ¹²

The names which immediately come to mind upon hearing these descriptions are St. Maximilian Kolbe, St. Padre Pio, Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and Servant of God John Paul II. Indeed, even the greatest cynic could not deny either the holiness or the passionate Marian devotion held by each of these modern-day saints. Their very lives serve as a shining example to all the faithful of how the Virgin Mary can indeed makes us "friends of God" by teaching us the holiness and humility of Her Son whose life she witnessed firsthand.

The Epic Battle: The Woman Clothed with the Sun

The last verses of the entire chapter of Wisdom 7 (verses 29-30) are perhaps the most poignant because they encompass all of salvation history in just a few phrases. The words in these verses concisely reflect the images in both Genesis and Revelation, in which there is a "woman" intimately connected to Christ in the Redemption of the human race. These verses state, "For she is more beautiful than the sun, and excels every constellation of the stars. Compared with the light she is superior,...but against wisdom evil does not prevail." First, there is the symbolic imagery of the constellations & celestial bodies mentioned earlier. This imagery reflects that of both Song of Solomon 6:10 as well as Revelation 12, both of which have been interpreted as being Mary in the liturgy of the Church (see liturgical section).

Genesis 3:15 & the New Eve

As previously stated, verse 30 refers back to Genesis 3:15, which is called the "Protoevangelium" or "First Gospel," because it is the first indication that God will save His people from the fall. In it, God says to the serpent concerning Eve that He will "...put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel." The word "enmity" here implies a complete and total opposition. Since we know that Eve was not in total enmity with the serpent, having given into his cunnings, and further that she did not have righteous and victorious offspring, we must therefore look to another "woman" of Scripture, to a "New Eve": that woman's name is Mary. Mary, unlike Eve, was in complete enmity with the "serpent" (being without sin) and did have a child who was victorious over sin, death, and Satan: Jesus Christ. This is also the only place in Scripture which speaks of the seed of a woman instead of a man. ¹³This is extremely significant because Jesus did not have a human father, but only human mother. It should also be clarified here that in many representations, most notably the Miraculous Medal, Mary herself is seen crushing the head of the serpent. This stems from St. Jerome's 5^th Century interpretation of Genesis 3:15 which said, "She shall crush your head, and you shall bruise her heel." Jerome uses the Latin "ipsa" which means "she," however later modern translations designate the word as "he." The Hebrew from which Jerome made the translation could have been validly rendered as "he" or "she," but Jerome (who was a biblical and linguistic scholar) was convinced that the pronoun referred back to the antecedent "woman." Other Old Testament Marian types that support this idea of Our Lady crushing the head of Satan are found with Jael in Judges 5:26 and with Judith in Judith 13:8 (see also Song. 6:10). In either case, however, the truth remains the same that Mary was intimately involved in the downfall of Satan through her connection to Jesus Christ. ¹⁴

This idea of Mary as the "Second Eve" is seen as early as the 2^nd and 3^rd Centuries by St. Justin Martyr, St. Irenaeus, and Tertullian, and is also echoed throughout Church Tradition. ¹⁵ Just as Adam and Eve fell together, the New Adam chooses the New Eve to play an irreplaceable though subservient role in salvation. Irenaeus points out a striking correlation between the temptation of Eve and the Annunciation of the angel Gabriel to Mary. ¹⁶ Bouyer remarks that in both instances, the man performs the essential act, but the woman prepares the way. The fallen angel Lucifer appears to Eve to incite prideful doubt and disobedience, whereas the loyal angel Gabriel appears to Mary to encourage her humble and faithful obedience. Furthermore, childbearing, the pain of which was a curse in Genesis 3:16, will later become the salvation of women (1 Tim. 2:15). Mary's childbearing, however, became the salvation not only for herself but for all mankind as her child was the Incarnate Son of God who took our place on the Cross. ¹⁷St. Jerome puts it very succinctly: "death through Eve, life through Mary." ¹⁸ Just as Eve was "the mother of all living," (Gen. 3:20), Mary is the Mother of all who live in Christ (Rev. 12:17). Adam and Eve chose to spiritually die rather than to control their base desires (Gen. 2:17), whereas Christ and Mary chose to die to their flesh (literally in the case of Christ) in order to live spiritually and to accomplish God's will. While these numerous similarities are persuasive, there still remains one of the most convincing parallels between the Fall in Eden and the Crucifixion of Christ. Eve stood at the base of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and ate of its forbidden fruit, causing her spiritual death. Mary, the New Eve, stands at the foot of the Tree of Life on which our Savior died for us. On that Tree, Christ Himself hung as the New Fruit of grace and salvation. That Fruit, the Fruit of Jesus' very Body and Blood, we are able to consume in the Eucharist at every single Mass, which spurs us on to the victory of eternal life (see John 6).