SOCIOLOGICAL-STRUCTURAL CONSTRAINTS UPON

WISDOM:  THE SPATIAL AND TEMPORAL MATRIX OF

                             PROVERBS 15:28-22:16

 

 

 

 

                                                 By

                                   Brian Watson Kovacs

                   VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY, PH.D., 1978

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                 © Brian Watson Kovacs, 1978

                                       Used with permission

                  Digitized by Dr. Ted Hildebrandt and Dr. Perry Phillips,

                                       Gordon College, 2007

 

 

 

                                 PREFACE

            This dissertation represents an attempt at

synthesis—and closure—to an intellectual odyssey that

has lasted nearly fifteen years. It combines disparate

elements, which may ultimately prove incommensurable. Its

conclusion has been much delayed, causing pain and frus-

tratin not only to me but to those who thought they saw

something of value in it and in the lines of inquiry sug-

gested by it. Time has made it a more thorough and mature

document, especially the analysis of Proverbs IIb itself,

though at the cost of some inconsistency and, loss of

clarity. Parts of this work were written at various times

over an eight-year period. Ideas change. Approaches

change. The writer who finished this work is far different

from the one who started it. From it, however, has de-

veloped a conception of interdisciplinary research and

teaching that may justify its deferral. Such integration

means that much impinges on what is actually said here that

cannot be dealt with adequately or at length. I have

faced the difficult choice of whether or not to cite my

other work. For one whose career and research are less

integrative, the choice is easy. Humility usually wins out.

I doubt the humility, however, of failing to mention what

                                       iiii

 

is an inherent part of the formulative process. So, I

choose to cite myself, at the risk of seeming arrogant,

to clarify the synthesis which this work represents.

            I wish that I could do justice to the encourage-

ment and support that I have received over so many years

in producing this dissertation. To mention some people is

to do injustice to others by leaving them out. I am

fortunate to have such good and caring friends, whose coun-

sel and whose friendship I value above all else in the

world. Jim Crenshaw has been friend, colleague and teacher.

I know that I am a mystery to him and that that mystery is

more grief than glory. His guidance and influence pervade

this work and the life that is represented through it.

Phil Hyatt ordered me to create a synthesis in my disserta-

tion.¹ hope some measure of what he sought can be found

here. John Gammie offered insight and encouragement when

the vision seemed to have been lost. Norman Gottwald pro-

vided a superb critique of the theses underlying the chapter

on Proverbs IIb. The Dempster Graduate Fellowship under-

wrote travel and research for some of the work on this

dissertation. To my Committee, working under duress—

Walter Harrelson, Dan Patte, Doug Knight, Howard Harrod—

I offer my thanks and condolences. Gene Floyd made sense

of the senseless and converted it into typed manuscript, for

which thanks are hardly adequate recognition. Many other

                                      iv

 

people should see themselves and their influence among

these pages; that friendship is beyond value or mere men-

tion. For all of them, this work at last is finished.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                           v                                                   

 

                         TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

                                                                                                                        Page

PREFACE                                                                                                      iiii

LIST OF TABLES                                                                                          vii

Procedure

Chapter

            1.         INTRODUCTION                                                                  1

                        Background                                                                            1

                        Procedure                                                                              13

            II.         THE DEFINITION OF WISDOM                                        31

            III.       A WISDOM TYPOLOGY                                                    105

            IV.       HE STRUCTURE OF THE BOOK OF PROVERBS          246

            V.        THE SPATIAL AND TEMPORAL MATRIX OF

                        PROVERBS 15:28-22:16                                                    317

                        Introduction                                                                           317

                        Space                                                                                      322

                        Time                                                                                       475

            VI.       CONCLUSION                                                                      516

APPENDIX                                                                                                    519

SELECTEb BIBLIOGRAPHY                                                                      580

                                       LIST OF TABLES

Table                                                                                                               Page

            1.         Terms for "Wisdom," "Understanding,"

                        "Knowledge" .                                                                        520

            2.         Terms Relating to Folly or Ignorance                                 521

            3.         Additional Technical Wisdom Terms                                  522

            4.         Additional Technical Wisdom Terms

                        Peculiar to Proverbs 10 ff                                                    523

            5.         The Semantic Field of Wisdom (Adapted

                        from Fohrer's Analysis)                                                        524

            6.         Characteristics of Wisdom, Late Wisdom

                        and Myth (Adapted from H. H. Schmid)                             527

            7.         Antithesis                                                                               534

            8.         Sayings Dealing with Yahweh                                              535

            9.         Architecture of Proverbs 15:28-22:16                               538

            10.       Royal Sayings                                                                        540

            11.       Twb-mn Sayings                                                                    540

            12.       Twb Sayings (Word "Twb" Appears, Irrespec-

                        tive of Form)                                                                         541

            13.       Admonition or Vetitive Form                                              541

            14.       Propriety Sayings                                                                 542

            15.       Wisdom Terms                                                                      543

            16.       Elements of Wisdom                                                            546

            17.       Lb Sayings                                                                              549

            18.       Ignorance                                                                               549

            19.       Folly                                                                                       550

 

                                                           vii

 

Table                                                                                                               Page

            20.       Discipline                                                                              550

            21.       'Instruction' Sayings: Mwsr                                      551

            22.       Speech                                                                                    551

            23.       Irony                                                                                       552    

            24.       Friend/Neighbor Sayings                                                      552    

            25.       Law Courts                                                                             553

            26.       Elements of Evil and Folly                                                   554

            27.       Simple Retribution:  Without Yahweh's

                        Agency                                                                                   558

            28.       Gulf Between Wisdom and Folly                                        558

            29.       Adversity Sayings                                                                  559

            30.       Altruism                                                                                 559

            31.       Noblesse Oblige                                                                    560

            32.       Wealth                                                                                    560

            33.       The Powerful                                                                         561

            34.       Poverty                                                                                   561

            35.       Hisd Sayings                                                                           561

            36.       Wisdom Standard of Values: Implied "Higher

                        Standard                                                                                  562

            37.       Status Quo                                                                              562

            38.       Slave Sayings                                                             563

            39.       Intentionality                                                                         563

            40.       Miscellaneous Special Concepts                                         540

            41.       Familistic Sayings                                                                 564

            42.       Contagion                                                                               565                            

                                             viii

 

Table                                                                                                               Page

            43.       Vulnerability                                                                         567

            44.       'Way' Sayings: Drk                                                                568

            45.       Observation (Form)                                                              568

            46.       Descriptions                                                                          569

            47.       Pragmatic Sayings                                                                 569

            48.       Teaching                                                                                 570

            49.       The Righteous                                                                        570

            50.       Purpose/End of the Wicked                                                 571

            51.       Weights-Measures-Scales                                                   571

            52.       'Abomination' Sayings: Tw^cbh                                              572

            53.       Naturalistic Savings [Or, Neo-  

                        Naturalistic]                                                                           572

            54.       Animals                                                                                  573

            55.       War Sayings                                                                           573

            56.       (Rhetorical) Questions                                                         573

            57.       Attitude                                                                                  574

            58.       Light/Lamp Sayings                                                             574

            59.       'Spirit' Sayings: Rwhi                                                             575

            60.       Correction, Admonition                                                       575

            61.       Tradition                                                                                576

            62.       Npš: Sayings                                                                         576

            63.       Yr't-yhwh Sayings                                                                 577

            64.       Life Sayings                                                                           577

            65.       Death Sayings                                                                        578

                                                 ix

 

 

Table                                                                                                               Page

            66. Sayings Involving "Fate"                                                             578

            67. Future                                                                                           579

            68. Sickness                                                                                       579

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                            x

 

 

                                          CHAPTER I

 

                                       INTRODUCTION

 

                                            Background

 

            As both literature and philosophy of life, the

Hebrew mashal holds a powerful elective affinity for the

Modern reader. Its seeming assurance about the means and

ends of 1ife is tempered with a certain irony. It often   

exhibits a humanistic concern. Together, the sayings en-

capsulate and hold up to view features of human experience

that transcend a separation of considerable physical,

temporal, social and cultural space. Superficially, their

settings and their objectives seem to require no elaborate

translation. Literatures and philosophies arising from

entirely different social and historical settings may have

a special saliency, as it were an "elective affinity," for

a particular group at some specific time in its social

history.¹ Such is the case, I suggest, in our (hermeneutic)

 

            ¹Max Weber originally coined the term Wahlver-

wandtschaften--"elective affinities"--as sociological term-

inus technicus in the articulation of his theoretical  

approach to the study of religion's development as social

ideology. He appropriated the word from the title of a

lesser-known novel of Goethe's. In his usage, it refers to

the dialectic relationship that exists between social

 

                                             1

                                                                                                            2

re-discovery of wisdom and wisdom literature.

            Because the original setting is no longer relevant

in such affinities and because the new social application

invests these works and ideas with quite different meanings

and emphases, the literary historian must be scrupulous to

avoid anachronism which arises from attributing historical

validity to saliences that are in fact creatures of his

own time. The biblical scholar of this wisdom finds him-

self or herself today operating under just such prudential

admonitions. Certainly, intellectual understanding is

hermeneutic, indeed it may even be normative.¹ The scholar

 

structure and its legitimating ideology: each alters the

other in systematic, if not determined, ways. The explana-

tions that groups develop to interpret their social reality,

which are often derived through historical processes from

the cultural stuff of other peoples at other times and

places, have a basic compatibility with the social organiza-

tion which values, preserves and transmits them. This com-

patibility increases with time. Ideas change social struc-

ture; social organization alters its legitimating interpre-

tive system over time.  Thus, all ideology is hermeneutic.

Elective affinities--the interactions between groups and

their interpretive realities--become powerful but creative

social forces. Weber's archetypal case is laid out in his

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, trans.

Talcott Parsons (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1958);

and his "The Protestant Sects and the Spirit of Capitalism,"

in From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, trans., ed. and

with an introduction by H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills

(New York: Oxford University Press, 1946), pp. 129-56. See

also his Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive

Sociology, ed. Guenther Roth and Claus Wittig, trans.

Ephraim Fischoff et al., 3 vols. (New York: Bedminster Press,

1968), 2:447-529, 583-90.

            ¹Richard E. Palmer, Hermeneutics: Interpretation 

Theory in Schleiermacher, Dilthey, Heidegger and Gadamer,

 

                                                                                                            3

must somehow strive to manipulate this tool of our under-

standing without being in turn controlled or manipulated by

it more than some hermeneutically essential minimum.

Literary historical research is a cumulative and approxi-

mative science. As all our scholarly implements become

more sophisticated, as our application of them is refined,

issues we believe to have settled must be raised, debated

and answered again. We observe this kind of flux in current

studies of wisdom in general and of the mashal collections

of Proverbs in particular.¹

 

Northwestern University Studies in Phenomenology and Existen-

tial Philosophy, ed. John Wild. (Evanston: Northwestern Uni-

versity Press, 1969), pp. 12-32. See also Hans-Georg

Gadamer, Truth and Method, A Continuum Book (New York: Sea-

bury Press 1975); and Karl Löwith, Nature, History and

Existentialism, and Other Essays in the Philosophy of History,

ed. with a Critical Introduction by Arnold Levison, Northwestern

University Studies in Phenomenology and Existen-

tial Philosophy,  ed. John Wild (Evanston: Northwestern Uni-

versity Press, 1966).

            ¹James L. Crenshaw surveys this development in his

introduction to an important collection of essays reflect-

ing research into wisdom and the directions it has taken in

the last generation or so of scholarship, "Prolegomenon,"

in Studies in Ancient Israelite Wisdom, The Library of Bib-

lical Studies, ed. Harry M. Orlinsky (New York: KTAV Pub-

lishing House, 1976), pp. 1-60. See also his article

"Wisdom in the Old Testament," in The Interpreter's Dic-

tionary of the Bible: Supplementary Volume (Nashville:

Abingdon, 1976), pp. 952-56. In the same volume, see

Ronald J. Williams, "Wisdom in the Ancient Near East," pp.

949-52; and Hans G. Conzelmann, "Wisdom in the New Testa-

ment," pp. 956-60. Also, James L. Crenshaw, "Wisdom," in

Old Testament Form Criticism, ed. John H. Hayes, Trinity

University Monograph Series in Religion, vol. 2, ed. John H.

Hayes (San Antonio: Trinity University Press, 1974), pp.

225-64; Gerhard von Rad, Weisheit in Israel (Neukirchen-

 

                                                                                                            4

            All historical criticism of literature requires the

operating assumption that a work somehow, in form or con-

tent or motif, betrays and conveys the setting within which

it was constructed into its present form, however composite.

In a complex work, if we can isolate the earlier constituent

elements, we may be able to discern important aspects of

its socio-historical development, as well as the lineaments

of its literary history. Individual works may resist such

analysis, perhaps because they are too brief, their lan-

guage too ambiguous, or the effects of later redaction too

gross; but, to reject this working assumption is ultimately

to deny the possibility of doing meaningful study of lit-

erary works as the stuff of social and intellectual history.

How we retrieve this history is a question, of methodology.

If we accept, albeit with some generosity the implications

of affinities as hermeneutic, we may admit that different

methodologies will be effective with different elements or

aspects of this history. There is a congeniality--affinity

--of methodology and material, as well as of social struc-

ture and ideology. Indeed, we may need to be methodologi-

cally eclectic if we are to deal adequately with this

 

Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1970): On this concept of in-

terpretation as it applies to the development of exegesis,

see Georg Fohrer, et al., Exegese des Alten Testaments:

Einführung in die Methodik, Uni-Taschenbücher, vol. 267

(Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1973), pp. 9-30.

 

                                                                                                            5

history at all.¹

            The problem of setting resembles in its implica-

tions the aesthetic issue of intention, though the Biblical

scholar seldom has the opportunity to raise the latter, and

often then only by indirection. What may at first seem to

be a marginal change in setting can have considerable in-

fluence on the interpretation to be given to a work. The

"what-it-meant" side of hermeneutic's dialectic of analysis

includes not only the bare meaning of the words used, but

who communicated through them (i.e., their social location)

and how they were used.  We can be frustrated by knowing

what the words say without knowing what they said:  what

they meant in that social and historical context.² The

phenomenologically-informed researcher sees the problem of

setting divided into two poles of investigation.

            First, within what objective social order did this  

literature arise and acquire its meaning? We seek a his-

tory of the society’s institutions with their system and

 

            ¹Fohrer, et al., pp. 9-30, 148-71.

            ²Hans-Georg Gadamer, "On the Scope and Function of

Hermeneutic Reflection," trans. G. B. Hess and R. E. Palmer,

Continuum 8 (1970):77-95; and his Philosophical Hermeneutics,

trans. and ed. David E. Linge (Berkeley: University of

California Press, 1976). See also, Paul Ricoeur, History 

and Truth, trans. with an Introduction by Charles A.

Kelbley, Northwestern University Studies in Phenomenology

and Existential Philosophy, ed. John Wild (Evanston: North-

western University Press, 1965).

 

                                                                                                            6

order projected against the comparative background of the

histories and institutions of neighboring societies. This

aspect of meaning also includes the question what standing

the works and their authors both held and acquired within

the community. Thus, the question of canon finally is

relevant to the objective meaning of a work.¹

            Second, how did the writer(s) perceive and struc-

ture the experiential world to achieve that understanding  

which he attempted to communicate in his work? Here we are

concerned with the subjective pole of meaning. A work be-

speaks the worldviews of its authors and editors. Where

the literary history is convoluted and the internal con-

struction of the work has become complex and interwoven,

the search for consistent and intelligible world-views can

become quite demanding. Here again, the danger is that the

researcher's ideas of "intelligible" or "consistent" which

are his cultural and personal perceptions of rationality

may be imposed on the work. Since the wise seem to have

been attempting to organize and interpret the realm of

 

            ¹Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations: An Intro-

duction to Phenomenology, trans. Dorothy Cairns (The Hague:

Martinus Nijhoff, 1960), cp. 56-88; Alfred Schutz, The

Phenomenology of the Social World, trans. George Walsh and

Frederick Lehnert, Northwestern Studies in Phenomenology

and Existential Philosophy, ed. John Wild (Evanston: North-

western University Press, 1967), pp. 1-44; Peter L. Berger

and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality:

A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge (Garden City, N.Y.:

Doubleday & Co., 1966), pp. 45-85.

 

                                                                                                            7

experience in order to cope with it more intelligently and

successfully, the danger of anachronistic rationality is

far more immediate than its opposite: accepting any con-

tradiction or inconsistency, even to the controversion of

common sense, on the appeal to cultural difference or even

the oriental mind soi-disant.¹

            This second pole of analysis is especially important.

In order to comprehend a work adequately, we need to under-

stand it as itself a hermeneutic act: an attempt to give

coherent meaning to experience.  A literary work reflects

both subjectivity and objectivity. It results from the in-

teraction of the author(s)'s subjectivity and "objective"

experience perceived through traditionally-defined. objec-

tive social reality given an objective literary form. For

a time, biblical criticism attempted to deal with the sub-

jective dimension of hermeneutic by psychologizing biblical

writers as they were then historically understood. As

authors became schools, as biblical works unveiled their

complex composite character to researchers, psychological

 

            ¹Husserl, Cartesian Meditations, pp. 89-151; and

his Phenomenology and the Crisis of Philosophy: Philosophy 

as Rigorous Science and Philosophy and the Crisis of Euro-

pean Man, trans. and with an introduction by Quentin Lauer,

Academy Library of Harper Torchbooks (New York: Harper &

Row, 1965), pp. 188-89; Schutz, Phenomenology of the Social 

World, pp. 102-7, 144-76; Berger and Luckmann, Social Con-

struction of Reality, pp. 135-73; Peter L. Berger and Thomas

Luckmann, "Sociology of Religion and Sociology of Knowledge,"

Sociology and Social Research: An International Journal 47

(July 1963): 417-27.

 

                                                                                                            8

analysis of biblical literature became untenable in most

cases. Subjective analysis, however, was often discarded

with psychologizing.

            Literature is virtually the only historical arti-

fact which provides the scholar access to the subjectivity,

the mind or minds, of people in their historical matrix.

What it meant to be a person of such-and-such an ancient

social world is accessible, if at all, only through litera-

ture. Moreover, the only vehicle we have to accomplish

that reconstruction is our own individual subjectivities as

literary and social historians. The objective literary

artifact becomes the tool through which to project that co-

herent understanding which a particular layer or segment of

the work reflects. The objective document is the con-

ceptual product of a subjectivity.

            Since we can approach the work only through our in-

dividual consciousnesses, unnormed by access to any other,

our interpretation of the document and our projection of its

meanings are biased by our own hermeneutic of our own

reality, however much it may be the informed and structured

product of a process of social learning. The phenomenolo-

gist argues that certain standardized procedures can con-

trol, but not eliminate, this bias. To omit any attempt to

project the subjective hermeneutic pole is to omit one of

the most important social, historical and theological con-

tributions of this literature. Socially accepted

 

                                                                                                            9

interpretations of the world arise from the interactions

of individual consciousnesses, socially in-formed, with

socially-defined experiences. Meaning is both subjective

and objective.¹

            We are both the beneficiaries and the slaves of

the western distinction between faith and reason. We

recognize the need to ask how dedication to understanding

relates to the religious faith of a people, while we are

therefore compelled to investigate an issue that people, or

 

            ^lEdmund Husserl clearly states the problem in The 

Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Philosophy:

An Introduction to Phenomenological Philosophy, trans. and

an introduction by David Carr, Northwestern University

Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy, ed.

John Wild (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970).

He develops a subjective analytic in The Phenomenology of 

Internal Time-Consciousness, ed. Martin Heidegger, trans.

James S. Churchill (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,

1964). Another approach can be found Alfred Schutz and

Thomas Luckmann, The Structures of the Life-World, trans.

Richard M. Zaner and H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr., North-

western University Studies in Phenomenology and Existen-  

tial Philosophy, ed. John Wild (Evanston: Northwestern Uni-

versity, 1973). Cf. Hans-Joachim Kraus, Geschichte der 

Historisch-Kritischen Erforschung des Alten Testaments, 2d

rev. and enlarged ed. (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Ver-

lag, 1956, 1969). A variety of methodological essays deal-

ing with such a program may be found in Maurice Natanson,

ed., Phenomenology and the Social Sciences, Northwestern

University Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philoso-

phy, ed. John. Wild (Evanston: Northwestern University Press,

1973); Karl-Otto Apel et al., Hermeneutik und Ideologie-

kritik, Theorie-Diskussion. (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp 

Verlag, 1971); James M. Edie, Francis H. Parker, and Calvin

O. Schrag, eds., Patterns of the Life-World:. Essays in

Honor of John Wild, Northwestern University Studies in

Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy, ed. John Wild

(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970).

 

                                                                                                            10

at least the intellectual classes of that people, would not

have granted validity. In consequence, we may tend to take

silence on cultic or formal religious matters as dis-

valuation or outright rejection, rather than take it as a

result of the focusing of their attention. We speak here

not merely of the notorious argument from silence; it is

admittedly quite difficult to establish the givens of a

society. Whatever some group takes for granted is not open

to discussion, except either when it is no longer a uni-

versal social given or when it is confronted by a direct

challenge from within or without. The most important ele-

ments in the foundation of a people's understanding and in-

terpretation of the world are taken-for-granted.¹  They are

so basic that they need not be expressed. Rationalizing

objective reconstruction may overlook this taken-for-granted

 

            ¹Thomas Luckmann, The Invisible Religion: The 

Problem of Religion in Modern Society (New York: Macmillan

Company, 1961); Schutz, Phenomenology of the Social World,

pp. 86-96, 144-63; Alfred Schutz, Collected Papers, vol. 1:

The Problem of Social Reality, ed. Maurice Natanson, 2d ed.

(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1967); vol. 2: Studies in

Social Theory, ed. Arvid Broderson (The Hague: Martinus

Nijhoff, 1964); vol. 3: Studies in Phenomenological Philoso-

phy, ed. Ilse Schutz (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff„ 1966);

1:15-19, 224-31; 2:12-19, 53-63; 3:116-32. Cf. Norman K.

Gottwald, "Biblical Theology or Biblical Sociology: On

Affirming and Defining the 'Uniqueness' of Israel," in The

Bible and Liberation: Political and Social Hermeneutics,

a Radical Religion Reader. (Berkeley: Community for Religious

Research and Education, 1976), pp. 42-57; and in the same

place, Norman K. Gottwald and Frank S. Frick, "The Social

World of Ancient Israel," pp. 110-19.

 

                                                                                                            11

dimension since it is never stated within the work. Sub-

jective analysis may reveal it to us as we attempt to pro-

ject a coherent and meaning-full perspective on the world.

The demands of our subjectivity for coherence may reveal

what objective analysis must omit. Silence is a legiti-

mate tool of the literary historian, though it is among

the most difficult to wield.

            While great progress has been made in understand-

ing wisdom during the past decade, the interest in wisdom

studies has not carried as far as some of us might have

wished. Considerable debate has been devoted to the prob-

lem of definition: identifying what it is which distin-

guishes this phenomenon wisdom from other understandings of

the world.¹  The issue remains undecided.² While the ap-

parent secularism of wisdom has been called into question,

its rationality has endured.³  Still, the literature

 

            ¹Crenshaw, "Prolegomena," pp. 1-60; James L. Cren-

shaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influence upon 'His-

torical Literature," Journal of Biblical Literature 88

(June 1969):129-42.

            ² Crenshaw, "Wisdom in the Old Testament," p. 952.

Cf. John G. Gammie, "Notes on Israelite Pedagogy in the

Monarchic Period," paper prepared for the Consultation on

Wisdom, Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting,

St. Louis, Missouri, 28-31 October 1976; R. N. Whybray,

The Intellectual Tradition in the Old Testament, Beiheft

zur Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 135,

ed. Georg Fohrer (New. York: Walter de Gruyter, 1974).

            ³Walther Zimmerli, "The Place and Limit of the Wis-

dom in the Framework of the Old Testament Theology,”

                                                                                                            12

fragments on examination. What seems to be a single

literature either atomizes under analysis into a wide

variety of literatures having little in common, or else

wisdom becomes so broadly defined that it threatens to

absorb materials and modes of thought and expression whose

distinctive character we hesitate to surrender.¹  Either

wisdom as such hardly seems to exist at all, or everything

seems to be wisdom. We face a version of Moore's Paradox

of Analysis: every definition is either trivial or false.²

Every analysis of wisdom either does not adequately dif-

ferentiate wisdom from other material or it excludes from

wisdom what we obviously must include.

            In the chapters which follow, we shall try to ac-

complish two objectives. First, we shall try to resolve

the methodological difficulty of differentiating wisdom.

That is, we shall attempt to show what has been misleading

 

Scottish Journal of Theology 17 (1964):146-58; cf. his

earlier "Zur Struktur der Alttestamentlichen Weisheit,"

Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, n.s.,

10 (1933):177-204.

            ¹Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influence,"

pp. 129-42.

            ²G. E. Moore in his Principia Ethica (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1903); on which see Richard B.

Brandt, Ethical. Theory: The Problems of Normative and

Critical Ethics, Prentice-Hall Philosophy Series, ed.

Arthur E. Murphy (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall,

1959), pp. 164-66.

 

                                                                                                            13

in existing efforts to resolve the problem of wisdom: that

these efforts operate from fundamentally incompatible

methodological presuppositions. We shall then argue that

one approach, the social-historical (sociological), has

certain elements which here make it a more analytically

powerful and useful definitional methodology for the lit-

erary historian. Second, we shall take an instance from

wisdom, Proverbs 16:1-22:16 (which we are calling Proverbs

IIb for simplicity's sake) and endeavor to show how sub-

jective analysis based on this methodology can help us re-

fine our understanding of this literature and its social,

historical, literary and theological character.

 

                                Procedure

            My research into wisdom began as a suitably modest

enterprise. I wanted to demonstrate that it was possible

to project a distinct, clearly delineated world-view from

the material contained within one of the major biblical

proverb collections, Proverbs IIb. If convincing, such a

demonstration would show that the material stemmed from an

identifiable social milieu which might provide us insight

into the nature of wisdom—social and theological—at that

time. It would serve as a benchmark for developmental

theories of wisdom such as those of Schmid, Skladny and even

von Rad. The project would be self-validating. If it

 

                                                                                                            14

could be done and done convincingly, then a fortiori the

material used in that projection would have to constitute

something more than a loose editorial Gemisch. At the

least, it would demonstrate stringent selection criteria

at work in whatever earlier or outside material might have

been chosen for inclusion in the collection. At most, it

might help prove that the collection so—called should be

considered essentially a composition, however much it might

draw on traditional poetic conventions and stylistic or

—rhetorical techniques. Rhetorical analysis of the collec-

tion lends credence in fact to the latter position.

            Gradually, however, I came to realize that the

argument. being developed concerning Proverbs IIb represented

the linch-pin of a much larger, more convoluted and more

far-reaching argument concerning the nature of wisdom and

the wisdom movement. The analysis of Proverbs IIb cannot

readily be separated from this larger argument. On the

other hand, the lineaments of this latter would not be

clear by implication from an examination of the passage

alone.  There is, moreover, a methodological issue here.

I am making a plaidoyer for the applicability of a certain

methodology, and its operating presuppositions, to the prob-

lem of the nature and development of wisdom as a Hebrew and

early Jewish religious phenomenon. The discussion which

follows is not essentially a methodological treatise,

 

                                                                                                            15

especially since it argues for the necessity, not merely

the utility, of methodological eclecticism, a point in-

creasingly being emphasized in biblical exegesis. Rather,

it is an attempt to restructure some of the debate con-

cerning the nature and development of wisdom by an appeal

to the evidence.

            We begin by listing a number of different approaches

to the problem of definition that have been taken in wisdom

scholarship. Each has contributed to the refinement of our

understanding of wisdom as a socio-historical phenomenon

and has held significant sway in the scholarly debate. Each,

however, has been opposed by other persuasive approaches to

the problem of defining wisdom, and no one approach seems

to offer a clear and convincing superiority in its analysis.

The analytic paradox spoken of above remains: either we

exclude what common sense dictates including or include what

common sense dictates excluding, without decisively justi-

fying either alternative. The dilemma nay be insoluble.

Wisdom may be undefinable. Perhaps wisdom is a primitive

term whose definition ought never to be attempted as such.

Perhaps, as we shall argue, wisdom is not a single phenome-

non, but a variety of sometimes related phenomena which

must be distinguished from one another if our language is

 

                                                                                                            16

not to betray us.¹

            In reviewing the various approaches to definition

we should be aware that this debate has made significant

progress. Even without definition, important elements of

wisdom's modes of perceiving and relating to the world have

been established. The theological underpinnings of wisdom

have begun to appear.²  The problem of wisdom's claim over

 

            ¹Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, pp. 1-5; Crenshaw,

"Method in Determining Wisdom Influence," pp. 129-42;

Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon,” pp. 3-5.

            ²Berend Gemser, “The Spiritual Structure of Biblical

Aphoristic Wisdom," Adhuc Loquitur: Collected. Essays, ed.

A. van Selms and A. S. van der Woude, Pretoria Oriental

Series, vol. 7 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), pp. 138-49;

James L. Crenshaw, Prophetic Conflict: Its Effect upon

Israelite Religion, Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Alt-

testamentliche Wissenschaft, vol. 124 (New York: Walter

de Gruyte, 1971), pp. 116-23; von Rad, Weisheit in Israel,

pp. 75-148; Hartmut Gese, Lehre und Wirklichkeit  in der

Alten Weisheit: Studien zu den Sprüchen Salomos und zu dem

Buche Hiob (Tübingen: J. C. 3.: Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1938),

pp. 29-50; Horst Dietrich Preuss, "Erwägungen zum Theo-

logischen Ort Alttestamentlicher Weisheitsliteratur,"

Evangelische Theologie 30 (1970): 393-417; Horst Dietrich

Preuss, "Das Gottesbild der älteren Weisheit Israels,"

in Vetus Testamentum Supplements; vol. 23 (Leiden: E. J.

Brill, 1972), pp. 117-43; Hans Heinrich Schmid, Wesen und

Geschichte der Weisheit:  eine Untersuchung zur Alt-

orientalischen und Israelitischen Weisheitsliteratur,

Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissen-

schaft, vol. 101 (Berlin: Verlag Alfred Töpelmann, 1966);

Roland E. Murphy, "Wisdom—Theses and Hypotheses," in

Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor

of Samuel Terrien, ed. John G. Gammie, Walter A. Bruegge-

mann, W. Lee Humphreys and James M. Ward (Missoula, Mon-

tana: Scholars Press, 1978, forthcoming); and in the same

place, Hans-Jürgen Hermisson, "Observations on the Creation

Theology in Wisdom."

 

                                                                                                            17

its adherents has shown its authoritative nature.¹  On

the other hand, the flow and ebb of the tide of wisdom's

popularity in the past decade may be related to our in-

ability to make more progress than we have in developing

any decisive new in-roads in this research. Zimmerli's

reassessment of his position statement of 1933 gives ground

to modern critics but stakes out a territory not yet far

removed from that earlier one.²  The attempt to place wis-

dom at the center of Hebrew religious thought and practice

seems to have led to a proliferation of studies which

identified wisdom in virtually every strain of Hebrew re-

ligion.³ So much did this occur that hardly a biblical

book, hardly an era, hardly a literary form and hardly a

stratum of Hebrew religious thought, practice or society

remained free from wisdom involvement. This cannot be.

If everything is wisdom, then what is distinctive about

wisdom? The theological rehabilitation of wisdom almost

 

            ¹Crenshaw, Prophetic Conflict, pp. 116-23; Gese,

Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 29-50; Hans Heinrich Schmid,

Gerechtigkeit als Weitordnung: Hintergrund und Geschichte 

des Alttestamentlichen Gerechtigeitsbegriffes, Beiträge

zur Historischen Theologie, vol. 40 (Tübingen: J. C. B.

Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1968); cf. von Rad, Weisheit in 

Israel, pp. 102-30.

            ²Zimmerli, "Place and Limit of Wisdom," pp. 146-

58; Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 177-204.

            ³Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influence,"

p. 129, n. 1; Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, p. 1, n. 1.

 

                                                                                                            18

created a monster that seemed poised to invade and devour

the rest of Hebrew religious thought.¹  This apparent ex-

cess revealed a methodological weakness--in the sense of a

lack of precise and controlled research technique--which I

would suspect has also discouraged many wisdom enthusiasts.

Do we really know what we are talking about? Are our

methodologies and perspectives sufficiently conformable

with one another that we can engage in coordinated and

systematic research? While I submit that the answer is an

unequivocal “yes,” I also Imagine that some people have not

waited around for the answer.

            Thus, enumerating definitions becomes increasingly

unsatisfactory, not because it does not further the wisdom

debate, but because everything else seems to hinge on a

dilemma we have been slow to resolve. I propose, then, that

we work around the issue by recognizing the inherent multi-

vocality of 'wisdom.'  I suggest a typology of wisdom con-

sistent with the ways in which wisdom seems to appear for

us historically. We ought to be able to talk far more pre-

cisely and cogently with respect to a specific type of

wisdom than we can to "wisdom in general"--whatever that

might be. Again, perhaps part of our difficulty is that

we have been trying to compass too much: incompatible

 

            ¹Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon," pp. 3-6.

 

                                                                                                                        19

types of wisdom that, because of the methodologies or con-

texts out of which they appear, cannot be conformed to one

another, even for definition's sake, without producing in-

superable problems at the present stage of our knowledge.

The problem of wisdom, however, goes far beyond

epistemological or linguistic clarification. Fundamental

historical issues will not be solved by stipulation. Some

of these types of wisdom are trivial; others are arbitrary;

many are secondary or derivative. The question becomes:

what provides the fundamental conceptual power inherent in

the use of the term 'wisdom' that enables us to apply it to

find historical unity or coherence in what seems to be a

diverse variety of literarily-expressed historical phenomena.

If we must, we may ultimately trace the term to an in-

ference made by the historian. In other words, we may find

ourselves forced to argue that the Hebrews never explicitly

conceived of wisdom as a distinct social or religious or

intellectual phenomenon.¹ We would then see relationships

that people in that milieu never explicitly saw nor identi-

fied. Such a conclusion would be very costly. It would

gravely undermine arguments for the historical development

--evolution--of wisdom in any form. Combined with the

atomization inherent in some theories of wisdom, it would

 

            ¹Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, p. 54.

 

                                                                                                            20

threaten to leave us without a phenomenon as such to study

at all.¹ Thus, we potentially face precisely the opposite

threat to the current direction in wisdom studies. In-

stead of finding wisdom diffusing itself throughout Hebrew

life and thought, we might find the concept breaking down

as a powerful historical conceptual tool. It would be less

than edifying to be left with little more than a loose col-

lection of literary forms, perhaps an elite but diffuse and

undistinctive social milieu, or a semiotic of 'wisdom' and

related terms held together by little more than their

semantic field. What is at stake is the conceptual and ex-

planatory power of 'wisdom' for the literary historian.

            Evolutionary theories of wisdom, which predominate

in the field, force both the methodological and the his-

torical issues.  Most of these approaches depart from some

explicit or implicit philosophy of history which postulates

a series of compatible historical processes that can be

discerned behind the literature and its formal expression.

These theories represent an attempt to unify wisdom. One

type evolves into another as a result of historical

 

            ¹Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-

ence," p. 131.

            ²I develop this point in my "Evidence for the De-

velopment of a World-View in Proverbs: An Assessment,"

paper presented to the Southeastern regional meeting of

the Society of Biblical Literature, Atlanta, 17-19 March

1977.

 

                                                                                                            21

processes whose effects can be discerned elsewhere in

Hebrew society at that time, as well as at other points

in time and places in history.¹  A few of these positions

rely on pan-historic principles: the same fundamental

processes of change underlie the entire sweep of human his-

tory regardless of the scale of the analysis, the time-

period or the culture under study.² Evolutionary ap-

proaches raise the question what provides the coherence or

 

            ¹Typical, though by no means exhaustive, of such

approaches and methodologies are Otto Eissfeldt, Der

Maschal im Alten Testament: eine Wortgeschichtliche

Untersuchung nebst einer Literargeschicntlichen Unter-

suchung der mšl Genannten Gattungen "Volksprichwort" und 

Spottlied," Beiheft zur Zeitscnrift für die Alttestament-

liche Wissenschaft, vol. 24 (Giessen: A. Töpelmann [vormals

J. Ricker], 1913); Udo Skiadny, Die Ältesten Spruchsammlungen 

in Israel (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1962);

William McKane, Proverbs: A New Approach, Old Testament

Library (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1970) ; Schmid,

Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit.

            ²Formalism derived from the work of Andre Jolles

seems to have had a significant impact on the theories of

Schmid and von Rad. Andre Jolles, Einfache Formen: Legende,

Sage, Mythe, Rätsel, Spruch, Kasus, Memorabile, Märchen,

Witz, ed. Alfred Schossig, 2d ed. (Haile [Saale]: Veb) Max

Niemeyer Verlag, 1956); cf.. Hermann Bausinger, Formen der 

Volkspoesie, Grundlagen der Germanistik, no. 6 (Berlin:

E. Schmidt, 1968). While Jollesian formalism is by no

means the dominant theory in Germanistic studies, nor has

it been, its influence seems to have been pervasive in Old

Testament form criticism, if the nuances of vocabulary and

methodology are any guide; proving such influence, however,

is often difficult. Alternatively, Hegelian evolutionism

often seems to underlie exegetical methodologies. The.

argument for such an implicit historical philosophy goes

far beyond the scope of the present discussion, but it has

at least been sketched out in my paper, "Development of a

World-View."

 

                                                                                                            22

continuity that underlies and unifies such seemingly di-

verse or diffuse phenomena. What entitles us to postulate

of them such transformations? Obviously, we cannot appeal

back to the processes of change grounded in our philosophy

of history: the argument would be circular. The unity is

surely not self-evident: why should one form or type of

wisdom evolve at all, let alone develop into another specific

kind of wisdom? What does it mean to label these 'wisdom'

at all? The coherence cannot be an inference of the his-

torical researcher without being circular. Something about

wisdom, from the data, must justify bringing together ma-

terials that differ in type. The problem becomes more

poignant when one wants to begin talking about wisdom

evolving into rabbinic-legal or apocalyptic thought, or

literature, or social movements.¹ What can such a hy-

pothesis possibly mean?

            If the ground for such arguments is that there is

 

            ¹Jean-Paul Audet, "Origines Comparées de la Double

Tradition de la Loi et de la Sagesse dans le Proche-Orient

Ancien," in Trudy 25. Mezduradnego Kongressa Vostckovedov:

Moskva 9-16 Avgusta 1960, vol. 1 (Moscow: Izdatelystvo

Vostocnoj Literatury, 1962), pp. 352-57; Gerhard von Rad,

Old Testament Theology, vol. 1: The Theology of Israel's

Historical Traditions; vol. 2: The Theology of Israel's

Prophetic Traditions; trans. D. M. G. Stalker, 2 vols.

(New York: Harper and Row, 1962, 1965), 2: 300-15; cf.

Gunter Wied, "Der Auferstehungsglaube des Späten Israels

in seiner Bedeutung für das Verhältnis von Apokalyptik und

Weisheit," unpublished Th.D. dissertation, Bonn, 1967; cf.

Peter von der Osten-Sacken, Die Apokalyptik in ihren

Verhältnis zu Prophetie und Weisheit, Theoiogie Existenz

Heute, vol. 157 (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1969).

 

                                                                                                            23

formal unity, it would obviously be invalid. The same can

be said for perceiving some coherence or continuity of

world-view. Indeed, the problem is to find unity in what

is superficially diverse. To argue that wisdom and rab-

binism or apocalyptic represent essentially equivalent or

related thought-worlds would be patently absurd. While the

evolutionary argument is sometimes stated in terms of form

or thought, ethic or context, none of these is sufficient

for a valid and convincing argument, especially in light of

our epistemological (definitional) and linguistic (typolog-

ical) analysis. Implicitly or explicitly, such theories re-

quire, and are appealing to, another ground. Only if there

is a continuously-existing, identifiable and self-identi-

fied social group who seek, develop, preserve and transmit

'wisdom' can evolutionary theories have a convincing—

and valid—argument concerning this literature. If

the continuity is not sociological, then the very

diversity of the phenomenon undercuts the validity of de-

velopmental or evolutionary arguments, except as the

otherwise ungrounded expressions of a particular philoso-

phy of history. On the other hand, if some specific group

can be identified as the carrier of 'wisdom,' then its

typological diversity is secondary to a sociological and

socio-historical continuity. If there are no wise as a

specific historical group, whatever they may have called

themselves and however they might have derived their

identity, then 'wisdom' as a category of historical analy-

sis threatens to fall apart. Such divers forms, theologies,

 

                                                                                                            24

and social milieux do not provide their own unity; the

scholar's inference of unity or coherence must rest on

something beyond his methodology per se.

            The assumption that such a group existed is, on

the basis of present methodology, no less tenuous than the

assumption that 'wisdom' has a clear pre-analytic meaning.

Whybray has shown that the assumption is not clearly

grounded in the historical evidence.¹  The literature

does not explicitly refer to such a group, and references

elsewhere scarcely require such a hypothesis. Indeed, the

absence of an overt Standesethik is an often-noted pe-

culiarity of the Hebrew wisdom literature.² The fact that

such a group is methodologically necessary unfortunately

does not mean that it actually existed. To resolve this

problem, we need a new approach.

 

            ¹Intellectual Tradition, pp. 6-54.

            ²Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, pp. 6-54; von

Rad, Weisheit in Israel, pp. 39-148; von Rad, Old Testa-

ment Theology, 1:418-41;   "Struktur," pp. 177-

204; Zimmerli, "Place and Limit of Wisdom," pp. 146-58;

cf. Hans-Jürgen Hermisson, Studien zur Israelitischen 

Spruchweisheit, Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten

and Neuen Testament, vol. 28 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neu-

kirchener Verlag, 1968), pp. 94-96; Ephraim E. Urbach,

Class-Status and Leadership in the World of the Palestinian

Sages, Proceedings of the Israel Academy of Sciences and

Humanities, vol. 2, no. 4 (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of

Sciences and Humanities, 1966); cf. Brian W. Kovacs, "Is

There a Class-Ethic in Proverbs?" in Essays in Old Testa-

ment Ethics: (J. Philip Hyatt, in Memoriam), ed. James L.

Crenshaw and John T. Willis (New York: KTAV Publishing

House, 1974), pp. 173-87; Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon," pp.

20-22.

 

                                                                                                            25

            The analysis of Proverbs IIb, therefore, turns out

to have direct relevance to the problem of establishing

historical continuity to wisdom and therefore of being able

to speak meaningfully of 'wisdom' at all. An inquiry into

one work will not resolve these problems, but it may point

the way to a means of resolving them; or, it may show that

no resolution is possible at all. Here, the wide-spread

assumption that the Proverb material reflects a process of

collection becomes pivotal to the argument.¹  What we are

trying to do is address the problem of wisdom in a method-

ologically minimal way.²  Clearly, if we can speak

 

            ^lEissfeldt, Maschal, pp. 45-52; McKane, Proverbs,

pp. 10-22; Crawford H. Toy, A Critical and Exegetical Com-

mentary of the Book of Proverbs, Internatonal Critical  

Commentary, vol. 16 (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,

1899), pp. vi-viii; Helmer Ringgren, "Sprüche," in Sprüche;

Prediger; das Hohe Lied; Klagelieder; das Buch Esther,

trans. and ed. Helmer Ringgren, Artur Weiser, and Walther

Zimmerli, Das Alte Testament Deutsche: Neues Göttinger

Bibelwerk, vol..16, 2d rev. ed. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and

Ruprecht, 1967), pp. 7-10; Berend Gemser, Sprüche Salomos,

Handbuch zum Alten Testament, 1st series, vol. 16, 2d rev.

and expanded ed. (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck],

1963) , pp. 10-11; R. B. Y. Scott, The Way of Wisdom in the

Old Testament (New York: Macmillan Company, 1971), pp. 51-

59; Otto Plöger, "Zur Auslegung der Sentenzensammlungen des

Proverbienbuches," in Probleme Biblischer Theologie:

Gerhard von Rad zum 70. Geburtstag, ed. Hans Walter Wolff

(Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1971), pp. 402-16; cf. Skladny,

Spruchsammlungen; cf. Hermisson, Spruchweisheit.

            ²Norman K. Gottwald helped clarify the logic and

methodology at this point in his "Response" in the same

session to my "Social Considerations in Locating the Wise

of the Mashal Literature," paper presented to the Section

on the Social World of Ancient Israel, Society of Biblical

 

                                                                                                            26

meaningfully of wisdom at all, and if any literature re-

flects the existence of an identifiable social group in a

clear and unambiguous social milieu, it has to be the four

mashal "collections" in Proverbs: Skladny's A, B, C, D.¹

If these do not pass such a test, then the presumption

would be against any work passing such a test. If we can-

not ground our inferences, at least for Hebrews, here, then

it is unlikely that we can ground them socio-historically

at all. On the other hand, if we can demonstrate socio-

historical coherence within this material, then the weight

of the argument swings the other way. We are thereby en-

titled to infer such grounding for similar or related

materials--by form, context or world-view. Can we project

enough of the taken-for-granted world from this literature

to decide the question? I submit that we can, and that it

supports the postulation of an identifiable social group as

its source and matrix.

            To show such a group, we have to show three things.

First, we must show that they perceived themselves to be a

group, that they had a sense of self-identity. Second, we

would have to show that they formed a network of trans-

 

Literature-American Academy of Religion annual meeting,

San Francisco, 28-31 December 1977.

            ¹Spruchsalmmlungen, p. 6.

 

                                                                                                            27

mission whereby that sense of identity was preserved well

beyond the lifetimes of individual members of the group

through certain identity-giving symbols (here, religious

and linguistic, at least in their expression).  Third, we

have to show that there is a 'grammar' underlying their

world-view. That grammar represents a consistent set of

assumptions or symbolic interpretations of the world that

gives structure to what they say about it. The grammar is

not the world-view; it is a higher-order consistency from

which coherence of world-views derives.

            We argue, in effect, that for Proverbs IIb all

three criteria can be met. To do this, we have to under-

take the subjective analytic proposed above. We seek to

project the taken-for-granted world out of the material

using certain norming parameters--space, time and in a

sense word.  These are ineluctable phenomenological struc-

tures. They ground and are expressed through the grammar.

How do these people locate themselves within space and time

as they perceive them; how does word become the expression

of that location? If no group provides the matrix, if the

material is atomic and derived from a variety of diverse

social milieux as some suggest, then the attempt to pro-

ject should fail. Coherence should be lacking. Behind the

obvious inconsistencies and rhetorical peculiarities of the

material would lie nothing more specific than the general

 

                                                                                                            28

Hebrew cultural grammar.¹

            Can we find a subjective interpretation of space

and time which makes objective sense? We argue yes. If

so, then evolutionary hypotheses make sense on that basis,

but are also subject to critique on that basis. In other

words, while the world-view may change, the grammar must be

preserved. To change the grammar of the message is to ob-

literate the message. Its forms of expression, its prac-

tical presentation may change, but the grammar on me-

thodological grounds cannot. From a Structuralist point

of view, structure must be preserved (i.e., the grammar),

because only in terms of such a continuous synchrony is any

communication (here, historical coherence, continuity and

unity of expression and interpretation) possible at all.

In effect, to allow the grammar to change is to undermine

the possibility of sociality beyond any hope of restoration

on some other ground.  Thus, what we are undertaking is a

species of sociological and phenomenological Structuralism,

though linguistic Structuralists may balk at the use of the

 

            ¹Erhardt Güttgemanns, "Generative Poetics," ed.

Norman R. Petersen, trans. William G. Doty, Semeia 6

(1976), pp. 181-213; Brian W. Kovacs, "Philosophical Founda-

tions for Structuralism: Grounding the Generative Poetics

of Erhardt Güttgemanns," paper presented to the Consulta-

tion on Structuralism of the American Academy of Religion

and the Society of Biblical Literature, San Francisco, 28-

31 December 1977.

 

                                                                                                            29

term.¹

            We contend that the outcome of the analysis, a

clear grounding of wisdom and certain hypotheses concern-

ing wisdom, is self-justifying and -validating. The up-

shot for evolutionary theories is that those which do not

preserve the structure, the grammar, are ruled out of

court.  This happens to the von Rad hypothesis:  we submit

that it is grammatically untenable because it does not pre-

serve socio-structural synchrony in the subjectively struc-

tured world of space and time. The evolutionary theories

 

            ¹Güttgemanns, pp. 198-213; Kovacs, "Philosophical

Foundations for Structuralism"; Schutz and Luckmann, Struc-

tures of the Life-World; Gottwald, "Biblical Theology or  

Biblical Sociology?" pp. 42-57; Gottwald and Frick, pp.

110-19; Paul Ricoeur, "Biblical' Hermeneutics," Introduction

by Loretta Dornisch, ed. John Dominic Crossan, Semeia 4

(1975); Daniel Patte, What is Structuralist Exegesis?

(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976); Daniel Fatte, "Universal

Narrative Structures and Semantic Frameworks: A Review of

Erhardt Güttgemanns "Generative Poetics,'" paper presented

to the Consultation on Structuralism of the American Academy

of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature, San

Francisco, 28-31 December 1977. The sociological side of

this methodology was detailed in my paper "Contributions of

Sociology to the Study of the Development of Apocalyptic:

A Theoretical Study," paper presented to the Consultation

on the Social World of Ancient Israel of the American

Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature,

St. Louis, October 1976; also my "Toward a Phenomenology of

History in Sociological Theory," paper presented to the

Mid-South Sociological Association meeting, Monroe,

Louisiana, 3-5 November 1977. A theoretically important

exegetical word-study that deals with spatio-temporal issues

in wisdom is John R. Wilch, Time and Event: An Exegetical

Study of the Use of ^ceth in the Old Testament in Comparison

to Other Temporal Expressions in Clarification of the Con-

cept of Time (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969).

 

                                                                                                            30

of Skladny and Schmid are not ruled out, but require fur-

ther proof. The phenomena they point to, to show develop-

ment are intrinsic to the grammar in a number of cases,

and therefore are invariant. The remaining evidence tends

to be insufficient to prove the case except as a philosoph-

ical assumption.

            We begin with a minimal enterprise: to show that

certain structurally norming dimensions of experience,

phenomenologically understood, can be inferred from what

must incontrovertibly be regarded as wisdom if anything is.

We infer only what emerges through this socio-structural

approach. Our conclusion is hardly earth-shattering, for

we do not drastically revise the postulated social matrix

for this literature. We do show its compositional co-

herence, at least in terms of its structural grammar. That

coherence, however, has direct application to the problem

of how we are to speak of wisdom at all. From such minimal

analysis comes the possibility of a ground—group with

identity, continuous existence, grammar—for talking mean-

ingfully about the continuity and development of what are

otherwise apparently diverse and incommensurable phenomena.

If the sociological argument stands, then we have a com-

paratively powerful, historically-evidenced basis for making

valid and clear statements about 'wisdom.'

 

 

 

                                 CHAPTER II

 

                 THE DEFINITION OF WISDOM

 

            So far, we have spoken uncritically of  'the wise,'

'wisdom' and 'wisdom literature.' We have not yet at-

tempted to specify the relationship which might obtain

between the wise person and his wisdom, whether it be as

a system of thought or a body of literature. What sorts

of meanings lie behind these terms? Here we need to be

careful for we should not resolve critical issues in wis-

dom research by definition. We do not wish to assume

what we should only conclude after thorough study. Still,

cursory examination or simple reflection will show that

'wise' and 'wisdom' are by no means univocal.  Not only

can they refer to entirely different classes of people or

entities (when indeed they may be said to refer at all),

but they can be used as quite different analytical cate-

gories.

            'Wise' can mean whatever the equivalent Hebrew

term hākâm meant. The meaning of the English term becomes

a function of the historical analysis of language, in-

corporating the vagaries, ambiguities and multiplicities,

even contradictions, of the Hebrew.  'Wise' may refer to

 one system of thought, or another. It may refer to one

                                           31

                                                                                                            32

or more groups of people in the ancient world, or it may

designate their writings. It may serve as a term of con-

venience within the discipline to identify a discrete

group of writings which otherwise defy ready categoriza-

tion. It may designate a broad social force whose inter-

play with other forces helps explain the general dynamic

patterns of Hebrew history. 'Wisdom' may stand for a

particular intellectual ideal, or style of life, which

some group of writings may be deemed to reflect. The

evidence educed to establish the meaning of  'wise' in one

of these senses may be entirely irrelevant in deciding

another.

            While a meticulous author may successfully manipu-

late the same word in several different senses without

material ambiguity, at least for himself, certainly we

need to clarify the alternatives in such a broad and dis-

perate realm of discourse.  We should locate our position

clearly within it both to be intelligible and to be valid.

            Two basic questions provide the basis for our

terminological and typological discussions. (1) When we  

refer to Proverbs IIb as 'wisdom' and its author-editor as

'wise,' what do we mean? (2) What justifies our regarding

Proverbs IIb, not to mention the other mashal collections,

as wisdom? First, we shall ask how 'wisdom' may function

as a defined theoretical category. We shall list

 

                                                                                                            33

alternatives, some albeit quite obvious. Under certain

rubrics, we shall need to consider the scholarly contri-

butions which represent or summarize the options under

that mode of approach. In the next chapter, we shall turn

to a wisdom typology. A number of these categories re-

flect distinctively different settings, literary forms,

and patterns of life and thought within "wisdom." Rather

than treat them either as a function of particular me-

thodologies or presenting them in the form of a history of

scholarship, we shall treat them systematically. These

distinctions will be used to differentiate types of wisdom.

This discussion should help us decide what meanings and

types of wisdom are, or could reasonably be, relevant to

the study of aphoristic wisdom and the mashal literature.

We recognize that the distinction between definition and

type is somewhat arbitrary. Still, it may prove to be

useful for analytical clarity and intelligibility.

            As a scholarly term, 'wisdom' serves a number of

theoretical and practical ends. The list which follows is

intended to incorporate or represent the most important

of these. Important uses will require some discussion and

develop at the risk of digression. Given the present

stage in the development of wisdom studies, we have to

show how it is possible to talk about wisdom in this ma-

terial before we can begin to talk about wisdom there.

 

                                                                                                            34

            1. Wisdom is a field of study. In this view,

whatever wisdom is, it is a distinct phenomenon in Hebrew

history and religious experience, as well as in Hebrew

literature. Therefore, one can distinguish it as an as-

pect of Hebrew life and culture to be studied and reported

upon. This sense of wisdom is obvious; its presupposi-

tions, less so.  It assumes that wisdom is sufficiently

distinct yet internally coherent that one can study it as

a subdisciplinary specialty. Setting boundaries in a

discipline is rarely easy, especially in recent studies of

wisdom which find evidence of it in prophecy, myth, his-

tory and priestly-legal material.¹ Wisdom used in this

sense tells us something about the self-identification of

scholars, a legitimate concern, but not about wisdom as a

historical phenomenon.²

            2. Wisdom is a body of literature. The tern may

function either as a description--to relate works with

affinities of form and content--or as a convenient term, a

name, to associate works with certain traditional relation-

ships. Thus, Canticles is sometimes included as wisdom

 

            ¹Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-

ence," p. 129, n. 1; Whybray, Intellectual Tradition,

p. 1, n. 1; Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon," pp. 1-13.

            ²Crenshaw, "Wisdom," pp. 226-27.

 

                                                                                                            35

literature because of its traditional attribution to

Solomon, its apparent secularism, and its lack of fit with

any other category of Hebrew scripture. As a description,

wisdom entails that there is something common to these

works which transcends the obvious diversity.¹

            3. Wisdom is a system of thought. Whether this

system is a theology, sacrally founded and ordered, or a

“philosophy,” in the non-anachronistic sense of secular

and ordered, systematic and consistent, remains to be

demonstrated. Most attempts to define wisdom fall some-

where within this rubric. This sense is potentially one

of the most restrictive. It may exclude those writers and

works which adopt wisdom motifs but employ them in the

service of their own theological ends.²  On the other

hand, it is potentially the most powerful way of using

'wisdom.'

            “A coherent system of thought” closely accords with

some commonsense definitions of wisdom. Since our sources

are principally literary, we would expect them to express

 

            ¹Roland E. Murphy, Introduction to the Wisdom 

Literature of the Old Testament, Old Testament Reading

Guide, vol. 22 (Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical

Press, 1965); Scott, Way of Wisdom, pp. 19-22.

            ²Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-

ence," p. 133; Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon," pp. 1-13; Cren-

shaw, "Wisdom in the Old Testament," pp. 954-55.

 

                                                                                                            36

an orientation toward life which can be readily and sys-

tematically understood (i.e., learned) and intelligibly

communicated (taught).¹  We might, without undue violence,

subsume much of the history of wisdom study under this

rubric. We shall find, however, that there is often some

ambiguity between wisdom in this sense and wisdom in the

sense of one of the categories following below: e.g.,

between wisdom as conceptual system and wisdom as a pattern

of behavior. Wisdom seen as conceptual system--system of

thought--is the sense which follows most naturally from

our attempt to project a world-view from the literature,

though we shall have to deal with other approaches to

wisdom as well.

            We should consider the alternative kinds of defi-

nitions offered when wisdom is taken as a conceptual system

and pay some attention to the scholarship underlying each

of these alternatives. Among the terms which recur in

such discussions are "knowledge," "understanding" and "ex-

perience."²   The wise man recognizes the patterns that

develop in his experience. He objectifies these patterns

 

            ¹Ernst Würthwein, Die Weisheit Ägyptens und das 

Alte Testament: Rede zur Rektoratsübergabe am 29. Novem-

ber 1958, Schriften der Philipps-Universität Marburg, no.

6 (Marburg: N. G. Elwert Verlag, 1960).

            ²Crenshaw, "Prolegomenon," pp. 3-9, 36-37;

Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, pp. 6-14.

 

                                                                                                            37

into a more encompassing description.¹  He "knows how" to

apply this description to interpret and respond to novel

situations. Consider the interesting double-entendre in

the English word "experience." To undergo something is to

experience it: it is the occurrence of a single event.

To have undergone a wide range of diverse occurrences is

also called experience. To know how to deal with a wide

variety of often-novel situations is experience. Com-

petence can be experience.

            a) Wisdom as Geistesbeschäftigung. Jolles'

work with basic literary forms could certainly be classi-

fied with wisdom as form below. On the other hand, his

work provides the theoretical foundation for many subse-

quent theological studies in biblical wisdom. These build,

implicitly or explicitly, from the assumption that there is

a pattern of human conceptualization that corresponds

uniquely to each basic form. Wisdom represents a particu-

lar use of man's capacity to create his reality through

language.²

            Jolles' three terms for the basic functions of

 

            ¹Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, pp. 13-27; Schmid,

Wesen and Geschichte der Weisheit, pp. 79-84.

            ²Jolles, Einfache Formen, pp. 218-19.

 

                                                                                                            38

language are erzeugend, schaffend and deutend.¹  These

correspond to archetypal social roles: Bauer, Handar-

beiter and Priester.²  To give a word to something, a

thing or an event occurring in nature, is to create. It

becomes an independent existent through the word. The

word not only names by direct reference to a specific

situation, but it creates new applications beyond the an-

ticipation and power of the word's user. Superstition

reflects our attempts to do something effective about the

power of the word. Not only is the word potent, but it

organizes and structures the world of experience: not

erfüllen now but dichten. The reality which language

creates not only gives us direct access to history--what

we might call objectified experience--but it virtually

builds a separate reality, poetically. We can summon it

to mind, understand it and use it as understanding. The

world of poetry is independent of the existence of the

factitious world of experience. Finally, language gives

meaning. It is recognition and thought (erkennen and

denken). It structures life's patterns, helping one to

interpret new aspects of existence. Analogies and simi-

larities are perceived through language. Understanding,

 

            ¹Jolles,  Einfache Formen, pp. 9, 15.

            ²Jolles, Einfache Formen, pp. 9-15.

 

                                                                                                            39

then, is a linguistic process.¹

            Each spiritual task in human life (as Geistes-

beschäftigung) calls up a corresponding elementary form

of speech event: legend, saga, myth, riddle, saying,

"Kasus,"² memoire, fable and joke.³  While fable and

riddle are regarded as also being characteristic forms in

the study of Hebrew and ancient Near Eastern wisdom,⁴

Jolles' analysis of the saying or Spruch form in particular

seems to have had the greatest influence on scholarly

studies in wisdom especially those which treat wisdom as

somehow related to "experience."⁵

            Suffice to say that Jolles regards the saying as a

popular high-order abstraction from experience which so

tersely objectifies repeatedly experienced situations that

 

            ¹Jolles Einfache Formen, pp. 13-18.

            ²Case-in-point, legal case, situation--the novel

falls under this rubric.

            ³Jolles, Einfache Formen, pp. 218-22, passim.

            ⁴Hans Meinhold, Die Weisheit Israels in Spruch,

Sage und Dichtung (Leipzig: Verlag von Quelle und Meyer,

1908), pp. 13-21; Crenshaw, "Wisdom," pp. 239-47; Brian W.

Kovacs, "Reflections on Ancient Hebrew Riddles, Fables and

Allegories," paper presented to the Seminar on the Form

Critical Study of Wisdom, Society of Biblical Literature

annual meeting, Chicago, 30 October-2 November 1975,

            ⁵Von Rad, certainly in his Old Testament Theology,

1:355-459, and probably in Weisheit in Israel; perhaps

Schmid in his Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit; cf.

Hermisson, Sprüchweisheit, pp. 29-34.

 

                                                                                                            40

it is instantly intelligible. Its truth and application

to one's situation is immediately obvious. It recreates

the situation that led to its first utterance.¹  Since his

influence in Germanistic and linguistic studies is so

great, though perhaps somewhat idiosyncratic, we may sus-

pect other emphases to owe something to his work as well

wisdom as pragmatic and worldly-wise (the concern for ob-

jectified experience over systematic speculation; applica-

tion to life), wisdom as popular in use and form of ex-

pression, wisdom as secular (experience is general and re-

created; opposed to myth), wisdom as universal (the Spruch

is not culture bound), wisdom as immediate intuition (Jolles

in accord with Grimm), wisdom as knowledge objectified by

and expressed in language.²

            Since Jolles recognizes that a saying must origi-

nate with a specific individual and a particular situation

 

            ¹Jolles, Einfache Formes, pp. 128-29.

            ²Walter Baumgartner, Israelitische und Alt-

orientalische Weisheit, Sammlung Gemeinverständlicher

Vorträge und Schriften aus dem Gebiet der Theologie and

Religionsgeschichte, vol. 166 (Tubingen: Verlag von J. C. B.

Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1933); Johannes Fichtner, Die Alt-

orientalische Weisheit in ihrer Israelitisch-Jüdischen

Ausprägung: eine Studie zur Nationalisierung der Weisheit

In Israel, Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Alttestament-

liche Wissenschaft, vol. 62 (Giessen: Verlag von Alfred

Töpelmann, 1933); Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 177-204; Gese,

Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 7-11, 42-50; von Rad, Weisheit  

in Israel, pp. 13-27; Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, pp.

6-14, 75-76; Gemser, "Spiritual Structure," pp. 138-49.

                                                                                                            41

before it can be re-formed and re-formulated in popular ap-

plication, his influence cannot be dismissed because a

scholar also recognizes the theological nationalism of ben

Sirah, the Wisdom of Solomon and IV Maccabbees through a

theory of the theologizing of wisdom. On the contrary,

Jolles' interpretation of the saying readily lends itself,

in fact invites, treatment in terms of an evolutionary

theory of history, especially one with elements drawn from

Hegelian dialectic. Thus, secular and practical wisdom

based on international models is re-formed and re-formu-

lated gradually to suit its new Israelite setting--re-

applied to experience a la Schmid—acquiring an appropri-

ate theological cast.¹

            b) Wisdom as know-how, savoir-faire. Fichtner

defines wisdom:

            Weisheit ist die Kunst, das Leben in jeder Beziehung

            und in alien Lagen wie ein Meister zu führen. Das

            setzt voraus, dass überall eine von Menschen zu

            erfassende Gesetzmässigkeit herrscht, nach der dem

            jeweiligen Verhalten ein bestimmtes Ergebnis ent-

            spricht. Diese Gesetzmässigkeit.meint der Weise im

            praktischen Leben des Tages, im Beruf, ira Verkehr

            mit den Menschen, überall beobachten zu können:

            mit einer Regelmässigkeit, die dem Beobachter als

            Gesetzmässigkeit erscheint. . . . Aus seinen

            Beobachtungen formt der Weise Ratschläge allgemeiner

            Lebenserfahrung und Weltklugheit. --Weiter sieht er,

            dass das Gemeinschaftsleben von dem einzelnen die

 

            ¹Schmid, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit, pp.

145-96.

                                                                                                            42

            Anerkennung der in der Gemeinschaft geltenden

            sittlichen Norm fordert. Von ihren Geltungsrecht

            innerlich erfasst erklärt er Unglück und Verderben

            als Folge der Übertretung der Norm, Glück und

            Gelingen als Folge normgemässen Handelns.¹

The wise so often saw this retribution which social norms

demanded that they conceived of it as a governing order.

Fichtner postulates a theologizing of wisdom in time,

"ohne freilich ihren Zusammenhang mit der übrigen alt-

orientalischen Weisheit völlig zu verleugnen."²

            Baumgartner points out that the Hebrew wise did

not develop systematic philosophy like the Greeks' but

“praktische Lebensweisheit. Weise ist, wer seine Leben

so einrichtet, dass es zu einem guten Ende führt."³ He

adds:

            Freilich was wir sonst im Alten Testament als

            spezifisch israelitisch kennen, tritt hier auffallend

            zurück: Sinai-Offenbarung und Gottesbund, Israels

            Erwählung und heilige Geschichte. Ja, von Israel als

            Volk ist überhaupt kaum die Rede. Die Chokma wendet

            sich an den Einzelnen, nicht ans Volk. Sie unter-

            scheidet nicht Israel und die Heiden, sondern Weise

            und Toren; und diese Unterscheidung geht mitten durch

            das eigene Volk hindurch.⁴

            c) Wisdom as anthropocentric counsel, erfahrungs-

gemäss. Zimmerli followed on the work of Fichtner and

 

            ¹Fichtner, Altorientalische Weisheit, p. 12.

            ²Fichtner, Altorientalische Weisheit, p. 59.

            ³Baumgartner, Weisheit, p. 1.

            ⁴Baumgartner, Weisheit, p. 2.

 

                                                                                                            43

Baumgartner with his classic study,'"Zur Struktur der alt-

testamentlichen Weisheit"¹ Taking Proverbs as a starting

point, he finds that the archetypes of the wise man and the

fool represent alternative total patterns or styles of life

(Gesamtlebenshaltung), which resolve the question of life,

rightly and wrongly respectively. Neither the answer nor

the question are in themselves interesting for purposes of

our interpretive understanding. Rather, we are concerned

with the kind of prior understanding, presupposition

(Vorverständnis) or preconception (Vorentscheidung) which

everywhere runs throughout and informs the wise' total

pattern of life.²

            Zimmerli does not present a simple definition of

wisdom's preconception of life. He does, however, set out

a number of characteristics that together typify wisdom.

First, it is anthropocentric; it is concerned with human

possibilities.³  "Sie behält ihren Schwerpunckt im ein-

zelnen, ungeschichtlichen Menschen, nach dessen Glück sie

fragt.”⁴  Second, though man is autonomous, he is a creature

 

            ¹His revision of this 1933 position falls under a

slightly different classification below.

            ²Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 177.

            ³Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 178.

            ⁴Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 178.

                                                                                                            44

and bound to the order of the creator.¹  Third, in Israel,

wisdom tends to depart from its aristocratic international

origins and become democratized. It becomes the property

of the people.²   Fourth, the admonitions of wisdom carry

authority, and they guide man through the "profane world."

This “authority” is not that of law or command; it is im-

personal while authority in the strict sense is personal.

The power of wisdom lies in its counsel (Rat, ^cēsāh).³

Fifth, wisdom is a summation of experience upon which the

advisee is to reflect, and from that reflection to act:

'grundliche Überiegung der 'erfahrungsgemäss' sich ein-

stellenden Folgen."⁴

            Der Schwerpunkt liegt also hinter dem Wortlaut der

            Anweisung in der Begründung, in den Erfahrungssatz,

            der von dem Menschen einkalkuliert werden soll, den

            er überlegen, aus dessen Überlegung heraus er

            handeln soll. Das konkrete Handeln ist im Grunde

            freigegeben.⁵

            Thus, Zimmerli calls attention to the existence of

two characteristic wisdom forms side by side, the simple

saying (Aussage) and the motivated admonition (Mahnspruch,

Mahnung). The first is obviously counsel. The second

 

            ¹Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 179-80.

            ²Zimmerli, "Struktur,” p, 181.

            ³Zimmerli, "Struktur,” pp. 181-88.

            ⁴Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 188-89.

            ⁵Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 188.

                                                                                                            45

acquires its power through its assessment of consequences

on the basis of experience. That is its authority.¹

            Es ist überhaupt kein Gehorsam von Wille zu Wille,

            sondern ein freies Verfügen des Hörenden auf Grund

            der ihm aufgewiesenen Zusammenhänge und Gesetz-

            massigkeiten.²

            Sixth, even in religious matters, wisdom thought

begins with man's possibilities and his interests.  Yahweh

does not appear as the imponderable authoritarian creator.

He is viewed from man's context in terms of his effect on

human activities.³  Thus,

            Auch die Begründungssatze der Mahnungen . . .

            lassen eine letztgültige Berufung auf gesetzte

            Ordnung vermissen und orientieren sich am ein-

            zelnen Ich und seinen Vortei1.⁴

            Seventh, Zimmerli finds the "better"-sayings (tôb-

min) quite significant. The wise did not hold a view of

absolute good in spite of the paired opposites (Zwillinge

--wise and fool, rich and poor, good and evil) so common

to the literature. Absolute good would imply clear-cut

duties for the wise. Rather, they compared possible values

and calculated outcomes. They considered advantages and

disadvantages. Zimmerli, therefore, takes over Fichtner's ,

 

            ¹Zimmerli, “Struktur,” pp. 188-92.

            ²Zimmerli, “Struktur,” p. 188.  

            ³Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 192.

            ⁴Zimmerli, "Struktur," p. 192.

 

                                                                                                            46

term "eudaimonistic" to describe this calculation and self-

determination (selbst-verfügen).¹  The naively optimistic

attitude of Proverbs reflects the perspective of normative

(international) wisdom, which asks the question, "Wie

steigere ich mein Dasein durch Glück, und Leben?”²

            Job and Ecclesiastes, however, call the mēden agan

of normative wisdom into question when they pose the    ques-

tion how man secures his existence in its negative form,

"Wie bewähre ich mich vor Unglück, vor all vor vorzeitigen

Tod?"³  They concern themselves with the limits of man's

control over his destiny.  Divine retributive justice still

acts in areas of life where man is powerless. They do not

reject the wisdom question. They do not curse God and die.

Nor do they see these limits as a direct conflict between

divine justice and human possibility, thereby negating the

wisdom hierarchy of values:⁴

            Der Weiseempfindet keinen Bruch zwischen seiner

            Einstellung und der Gottbedingtheit der Welt. Die

            Ansprüche Gottes und der Menschen brauchen nicht in  

            Konflict zu geraten. Sein Glaube ist es vielmehr,

            dass in der göttlichen Weltordnung für des Menschen

            Lebensverlangen aufs beste gesorgt ist, dass der

            eigentliche Glücksanspruch des Menschen im bereit-

            willigen Einflügen in die göttliche Weltordnung voll

 

            ¹Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 192-94, 203.

            ²Zimmerli, "Struktur," p, 198.

            ³Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 198-99.

            ⁴Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 194-204.

                                                                                                            47

            befriedigt wird. Auch Gott kommt zu seinem Recht,

            wenn der Mensch (auf dem richtigen Wege) sein

            Glück sucht. Und ebenso umgekehrt: Auch der

            Mensch kommt am allerbesten und sichersten zu

            seinem Glück, wenn er Gott fürchtet.¹

            Last, the fundamental orientation of wisdom is

a-historical because its fundamental concern is to under-

stand all of reality rationally, in its diversity and com-

plexity ("der naive Optimismus und die Geschichtlosigkeit

des Lebens als notwendige Ausstrahlung dieser rational-

istischen Grundhaltung").²

            As developed by Zimmerli and later summarized by

Schmid, this perspective on wisdom could be characterized

as rationalism, which could therefore well be sub-category

d). Schmid summarizes this view succinctly:

            Utilitarisch, eudämonistisch, rational, ursprünglich

            profan, später religiös, geschichtlos, überzeitlich:

            das sind die Attribute, welche die Weisheit während

            der letzten dreissig Jahre zu tragen hatte.³

What intellectual debt--if any--Baumgartner, Fichtner and

Zimmerli might owe to the work of Jolles would be difficult

to establish. They continue to see wisdom as founded on

common human experience and oriented toward “secular” ends.

Wisdom is knowledge; it is learned by and communicated as

language. For them, the archetype of wisdom seems to be

 

            ¹Zimmerli, “Struktur,” p. 203.

            ²Zimmerli, “Struktur," p. 204.

            ³Schmid, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit, p. 3.

                                                                                                            48

the saying. Von Rad's work proceeds from this view. He

himself expressly acknowledges Jolles' contribution to his

work.¹

            e) Wisdom as gnomic apperception. In his earlier

studies, predating Weisheit in Israel, von Rad speaks thus

of wisdom:

            Wie alle Völker, so verstand auch Israel unter

            "Weisheit" ein ganz praktisches, auf Erfahrung

            gegründetes Wissen von den Gesetzen des Lebens

            und der Welt. . . . Dieses Ausgehen von ele-

            mentaren Erfahrungen ist das Charakteristische

            fast für alle ihre Lebensäusseruncen. In alien

            Kulturstufen steht ja der Mensch vor der Aufgabe,

            das Leben zu bewältigen. Zu diesem Zweck muss er

            es kennen und darf nicht ablassen, zu beobachten

            und zu lauschen, ob sich in der Wirrnis der Gescheh-

            nisse nicht doch da und dort etwas wie eine Gesetz-

            mässigkeit, eine Ordnung erkennen lässt.²

            . . .  The means of laying hold of and objectifying

            such orders when once perceived is language. . .

            Undoubtedly [the Pairs of Opposites] are to be

            understood as primitive attempts to mark off certain

            orders and tie them down in words.³

            Here we find unmistakable parallels with Jolles.

Remembering that sayings represent normative wisdom, we

may continue with von Rad:

            Now, when we bear in mind that every people expended

            a great deal of trouble and artistry in the formation

 

            ¹Von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 1:421-22.

            ²"Die Ältere Weisheit Israels," Kerygma und Dogma:

Zeitschrift für Theologische und Kirchliche Lehre 2

(1956) :54-72; cf. his Old Testament Theology 1:418.

            ³Von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 1:418.

                                                                                                            49

            of this kind of Wisdom literature, and that gnomic

            apperception is in fact one of the most elegant

            forms of human thinking and a weapon in the

            struggle for spiritual content in life, it will

            be apparent that there are two completely dif-

            ferent forms of the apperception of truth for

            mankind--one systematic (philosophical and theo-

            logical) and one empirical and gnomic. Each re-

            quires the other. Where the one employed by the

            Wisdom literature is wanting, men are in danger

            of reducing everything to dogma, and indeed of

            runing off into ideological fantasy. Empirical

            and gnomic wisdom starts from the unyielding pre-

            supposition that there is a hidden order in things

            and events--only, it has to be discerned in them,

            with great patience and at the cost of all kinds

            of painful experience. And this order is kindly

            and righteous. But, characteristically, it is

            not understood systematically--and therefore not

            in such a way as to reduce all the variety ex-

            perienced and perceived to a general principle of

            order. . . . As Jolles says, conceptual thinking

            cannot possibly apprehend the world to which

            gnomic thinking applies itself. Wisdom examines

            the phenomenal world to discern its secrets, but

            allows whatever it finds to stand in its own

            particular character absolutely.¹

            To von Rad, the growing scepticism of Job and

Qoheleth does not represent a repudiation of wisdom.

Their conflict is only intelligible from wisdom's pre-

suppositions about the world. Thus in this respect, he

follows Zimmerli.²

            f) Wisdom as humanism. One finds quite a

different approach from the fore-going definitions and

 

            ¹Von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 1:421-22,

            ²Von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 1:441-59;

Zimmerli, "Struktur," pp. 198-204.

                                                                                                            50

descriptions of wisdom in this section when one turns to

the work of Rankin. His basic operating concept is

humanism.¹

            The Wisdom literature may be called the documents

            of Israel's humanism, not in the sense of a re-

            jection of the supernatural, or even as intending

            a concern chiefly with man's welfare, but because

            its general characteristic is the recognition of

            man's moral responsibility, his religious indi-

            viduality and of God's interest in the individual

            life.²

            All wisdom writings concern themselves with the

ordinary individual--even when wisdom becomes hypostasized

into an intermediary being between God and man.

            Because the interest of the Wisdom books is of

            this nature, they yield not merely a vast body of

            moral teaching but complete the foundation of

            thought upon which a theology could be built.

            . . .  They [the wise] are the rationalists of

            Hebrew thought and religion.³

            While prophetic and priestly thought took only

the community into account, the wise looked at a person's

peace, welfare and happiness in the context of family

and community. In wisdom thought, attention is paid to

the basic motives behind human conduct:  "gratitude,

 

            ¹O. S. Rankin, Israel's Wisdom Literature: Its

Bearing on Theology and the History of Religion; the Kerr

Lectures Delivered in Trinity College, Glasgow, 1933-36

(Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, n.d.), pp. 1-9.

            ²Rankin, p. 3.

            ³Rankin, p. 3.

                                                                                                            51

friendship, love, hate, wealth, reputation."¹  "Wisdom is

the ability to assess truly the values of life."²

            Weinfeld, in his studies of the relationship be-

tween Deuteronomy and wisdom, takes over the term

"humanism" from Rankin, following in the tradition of

S. R. Driver, Delitzsch and Cheyne.³

            The humanistic ideology which characterizes

            sapiential teaching scrutinizes all matters

            from the human point of view and consequently

            seeks those ends which will prove to be for

            "man's good."⁴

            . . . The conventional sapiential view identi-

            fies wisdom with the knowledge and understand-

            ing of nature's laws. . . ⁵

            Weinfeld approves Rankin's view that "the social

ideas of Proverbs are, properly speaking, distinctly

sapiential ideas, based on the concept of the 'equality

of men,' which in turn derives from the sapiential concept

 

            ¹Rankin, p. 4.

            ²Rankin, p. 4.

            ³Moshe Weinfeld, Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic 

School (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972); Moshe Weinfeld,

“The Orgin of the Humanism in Deuteronomy," Journal of

Biblical Literature 80 (September 1961): 241-47; Moshe

Weinfeld, "Deuteronomy--the Present State of the Inquiry,"

Journal of Biblical Literature 86 (September 1967): 249-62;

C. M. Carmichael, "Deuteronomic Laws, Wisdom, and His-

torical Traditions," Journal of Semitic Studies 12 (1967):

198-206; Jean. Malfroy, "Sagesse et Loi dans le Deuteronome:

Études," Vetus Testamentum 15 (1965): 49-65.

            ⁴Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, pp. 308-9.

            ⁵Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, p. 257.

                                                                                                            52

of the 'Creator of man' predominating in wisdom litera-

ture."¹  In this respect, scholars in this tradition

approach a view which we shall not discuss, wisdom as

creation theology  g). Continuing, Weinfeld contends that

this humanistic ideology is international. Still, he

argues that a special kind of theologizing process in

Israel led to deuteronomic thinking. The yir’at yahweh 

upon which wisdom is then said to be grounded reflects a

growing conflict with the conventional sapiential view

that wisdom is universal knowledge:

            The sapiential authors of these dicta apparently

            wished to say . . . that man's wisdom lies in his

            moral behaviour. They realized that the human

            mind could neither fathom the mysteries of creation

            nor acquire universal knowledge . . . and that the

            only wisdom man could aspire to was that which per-

            tained to human affairs, i.e. Lebensweisheit and

            not Naturweisheit.²

The ideology upon which the humanistic ethic is founded is

thus theologized and circumscribed. The deuteronomists

combined this new humanism with Torah.³

            The application of the term "humanism" to wisdom

tends to shade together several different conceptual

 

            ¹Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, p. 295.

            ²Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, p. 258.

            ³Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, pp. 158-319; Weinfeld,

"Humanism in Deuteronomy," pp. 241-47.

                                                                                                            53

categories. "Rationalism" (Rankin) and "ideology"

(Weinfeld) suggest a system or body of thought which

unites all of wisdom, as we have discussed above.¹  But,

“moral responsibility” and "moral behaviour" reflect wis-

dom as ethos: that wisdom distinguished by a certain

pattern of action.² The more, since there seem to be

severe limitations to the wise' ability to know. Wein-

feld also seems to use “wisdom,” "sapiential," and

"humanism" as theological categories to unite common

strands out of seemingly diverse intellectual movements

and divers social groups.³

            h) Wisdom as the perception of a divine or supra-

mundane universal order. This approach to understanding

wisdom takes its point of intellectual departure from

Egyptian wisdom and its doctrine of maat. Gese quotes

Frankfort's dismissal of eudaimonistic-pragmatic explana-

tions of wisdom:

            The usual comment on this type of advice is

            totally inadequate. It is neither a rule of

 

            ¹Rankin, p. 25; Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, p. 189;

cf. Whybray, Intellectual Tradition, pp. 1-14.

            ²We shall deal with wisdom as behavior or ethos

below. Of course, one can only infer what behavior was

historically from evidence, generally literary what. has

been said about the supposed behavior.

            ³Weinfeld, Deuteronomy, pp. 158-89.

                                                                                                            54

            good conduct, nor a plan for making a man popu-

            lar and likely to gain advancement--in fact,

            can think of no behavior more likely to get one

            into trouble.¹

Here, Frankfort refers to Kagemni's counsel not to eat

until a greedy man is sated nor drink until the drunkard

has taken his fill. His and Gese's remarks reflect a

general dissatisfaction with the rational-pragmatic inter-

pretation.²

            Frankfort argues that we have read a modern con-

trast back into history. We distinguish worldly savoir-

faire from religiously motivated ethical behavior. The    

Egyptian perceived no distinction. He lived in a world

suffused by a single order that was at once social, ethi-

cal and cosmological:

            The Egyptians recognized a divine order, estab-

            lished at the time of creation; this order is

            manifest in nature in the normalcy of phenomena;

            it is manifest in society as justice; and it is

            manifest in an individual's life as truth. Maat

            is this order, the essence of existence, whether

            we recognize it or not.

                        The conception of Maat expresses the Egyptian

            belief that the universe is changeless and that

            all apparent opposites must, therefore, hold each

            other in equilibrium. Such a belief has definite

            consequences in the field of moral philosophy. It

            puts a premium on whatever exists with a semblance

 

            ¹Henri Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion: An

Interpretation, Cloister Library of Harper Torchbooks

(New York: Harper and Brothers, 1948), p. 71; Gese, Lehre

und Wirklichkeit, p. 9.

            ²Gese, Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 7-11.

                                                                                                            55

            of permanence. It excludes ideals of progress,

            utopias of any kind, revolutions, or any other

            radical changes in existing conditions. It al-

            lows a man "to strive after every excellence

            until there be no fault in his nature," but im-

            plies, as we have seen, harmony with the estab-

            lished order, the latter not taken in any vague

            and general way but quite specifically as that

            which exists with seeming permanence.¹

            Order, maat, is no impersonal force. That would

be a modern concept. But, deviation from order is also no

act of rebellion. Disharmony brings about the inevitable

intervention of some deity in an act of retributive jus-

tice, but the operation of act and consequence is not

automatic. The world is permeated by a profound religious

order.  It is man's religious and ethical responsibility

to recognize this order and to put himself in harmony with

it. Thus, authority becomes significant.²

            Gese expressly applies the analogy of maat to

wisdam in Israel. There, he finds the notion of order,

not pragmatism:

            Wir müssen uns auch hier im Alten Testament vor

            der eudämonistischen Interpretation hüten, wenn

            wir nicht auf Grund der uns eigentümlichen

            Scheidung von innen and ausseren Erfolg, Mass-

            stäbe an die Weisheitslehre herantragen wollen,

            die ihr--zumindest in ihrem Ursprung--wesentlich

            fremd sind. Vielmehr wird hier in der Weisheit

 

            ¹Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion, p. 64.

            ²Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion, pp. 64-71,

passim.

                                                                                                            56

            auf Grund der Erkenntnis einer der Welt inne-

            wohnenden Ordnung gesagt, lass der Fleissige

            durch sein Tun reich, der Faule arm wird; und

            ebenso wird der Gerezhte Erfolg, der Ungerechte

            Misserfolg davontragen. Wir könnten fast von

            einer naturgesetzlichen Weise sprechen, in der

            sich die Folge aus der Tat ergibt.¹

            Gese notes the Unverfügbarkeit of this order in

both Egypt and Israel. Man is inescapably bound to the

fundamental order that gcverns the world. Act and result

are inextricably bound together (Tat-Ergehen-Zusammenhang)

in human action. Man is utterly incapable of interposing

himself in this complex.²

            Israel differs from Egypt. It breaks through the

fateful working out of this process (schicksalwirkende

Tatsphäre). Yahweh is independent of this order. We do

find royal ideology in wisdom; the king is the guarantor

of order. But, in the same way that Yahweh can act freely

with respect to the king, so Yahweh is completely free from

the order's jurisdiction. Israelite wisdom is not rigidly

determinist. Job emphasizes Yahweh's freedom with respect

to his created order, and strengthens the implicit double

standard in Hebrew wisdom: that wisdom is nothing with

respect to Yahweh. Job however accepts the fundamental

premise of order which typifies Hebrew wisdom. Its

 

            ¹Gese, Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 34-35.

            ²Gese, Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 44-45.

                                                                                                            57

solution leads us again into wisdom thinking.¹  Gese's

concluding sentence reflects the paradox of Hebrew wisdom:

            Die grossartige und tief religiöse altori-

            entalische Weisheit ist in Israel aufgenommen

            und bewältigt worden, die Bindung an meta-

            physische Ordnungqn wurde durch den Glauben an

            Jahwä überwunden.²

In sum,

            . . . The wisdom literature of Israel--like that

            of Egypt--seeks above all to discover the order

            that is inherent in the world and human life,

            making it possible for man to accommodate himself

            reasonably to this order. This inherent order,

            however, is righteousness. That is to say, the

            Hebrew s^edaqâ corresponds in function to the

            Egyptian concept of m3^ct, "truth," or better

            "righteousness," "orderly management."³

            i) Wisdom as the knowledge of authoritative

divine will. Gese's view of wisdom, in terms of order,

the relationship of act and result, and the freedom of

Yahweh, over against the anthropocentric-eudaimonistic

definitions, has steadily gained ground in wisdom studies.

Both von Rad and Zimmerli have substantially revised their

positions to respond to this line of reasoning

 

            ¹Gese, Lehre und Wirklichkeit, pp. 42, 45-78.

            ²Gese, Lehre und Wi.rklichkeit, p. 78.

            ³Helmer Ringgren, Israelite Religion, trans.

David E. Green (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966), pp.

133.

            ⁴Von Rad in his Weisheit in Israel compared to the

views expressed in his Old Testament Theology and "Ältere

                                                                                                            58

            Gemser was one of the first to recognize the im-

plications in Gese's proposals. His article on the

"Spiritual Structure of Biblical Aphoristic Wisdom" did

not propound a drastically new definition of wisdom so

much as pose certain problems that implied redefinition.¹

            First, he asked, with what authority does wisdom

teaching confront its hearers?  For Gemser, as for

de Boer,^{2  c}ēsah is not discussible advice:

            The counsels of the wise are not advice offered   

            without obligation to the free discussion and de-

            cision of the addressed, they claim to be listened 

            to and followed up and put into practice.³

            Second, from what does this teaching derive its

authority?  If Gese be right, authority derives from

divine order, permeating and interpenetrating the struc-

ture of the world.⁴ Von Rad points out that the search

for order is inherent in language itself:

 

Weisheit Israels"; Zimmerli in "Place and Limit" as op-

posed to his earlier "Struktur."

            ¹pp. 138-49.

            ²P. A. H. de Boer, “The Counsellor,” in Wisdom in

Israel and in the Ancient Near East: Presented to Pro-

fessor Harold Henry Rowley, ed. Martin Noth and D. Winton

Thomas, Vetus Testamentum Supplements, vol. 3 (Leiden:

E. J. Brill, 1955), pp. 42-71.

            ³Gemser, "Spiritual Structure," p. 146..

            ⁴Gese, Lehre and Wirklichkeit, pp. 33-45; Gemser,

"Spiritual Structure," p. 142.

                                                                                                            59

                        Parallel and intertwined with this universal

            ancient belief in an impersonal, yet authoritative

            world-order was the conviction that wisdom was a

            prerogative and gift of the gods; wisdom and word,

            intelligence and speech were even, in Egypt as well

            as in Babylonia and Ugarit, thought of as personal

            divine beings. No wonder that in ancient Israel 

            with its fundamental belief in a personal, even one

            personal Deity wisdom was seen as one of the most

            essential qualities of God, and the teachings of

            wisdom as the expressions of his will.¹

            Third, if all have equal authority, how does the

counsel of the wise differ from the words of prophets or

the torah of priests? The fact that these groups are dis-

tinct implies a clear difference in the types of authority

appropriate to and held by each. Gemser quotes himself in

reply, analyzing the semantic role of the motivating

clauses:

            "The motive clauses with their appeal to the common

            sense and to the conscience of the people disclose

            the truly democratic character of their laws, just

            as those (the motivations) of the religious kind

            testify the deep religious sense and concentrated

            theological thinking of their formulators."²

Motivations are a pedagogic device. “They are appropriate

to what is being taught; they are not an appeal to ex-

perience, nor evidence of one. We wonder, however, whether

Gemser has replied to precisely the question he set

 

            ¹Gemser, “Spiritual Structure,” p. 147.

            ²Gemser, “Spiritual Structure,” p. 148 quoting

from his "The Importance of Motive Clauses in Old Testa-

ment Law," in Copenhagen Congress Volume, Vetus Testa-

mentum Supplements, vol. 1 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1953),

p. 63.

                                                                                                            60

himself. This distinction must derive from didactic in-

tent and from setting, suggesting some unstated assump-

tions about the nature and objective of wisdom. Still,

Gemser clearly stated his intent to pose questions, not

necessarily to answer them, except perhaps by implica-

tion.¹

            j) Wisdom as artful life-mastery in the context

of a divinely created and ordered world. In response to

the growing emphasis on authority, theology, and divine

order, Zimmerli has modified some of his views on wisdom

thought, though not so much perhaps as Gemser has sug-

gested. Zimmerli continues to emphasize wisdom's anthro-

pocentrism. He points out, as Baumgartner had long

before, that "Wisdom has no relation to the history between

God and Israel."²  While people and king appear as socio-

logical elements in wisdom, one misses there even a

theologizing of the obvious Solomonic connection with a

possible covenant theology.³

 

            ¹Gemser, "Motive Clauses," pp. 50-66; Gemser,

"Spiritual Structure," pp. 138-49.

            ²Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 147; Baumgartner,

Weisheit, pp. 1-2.

            ³ Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 147; Crenshaw,

"Prolegomenon," p. 2.

                                                                                                            61

            Zimmerli raises to central importance a point he

had made in his earlier article. "Wisdom thinks resolutely

within the framework of a theology of creation.”¹  This

theology, however, is not based on an immutable order or

an instruction to trust in Yahweh.

            Wisdom is per definitionem tahbūlôth, ‘the art

            of steering,’ knowledge of how to do in life, and

            thus it has a fundamental alignment to man and

            his preparing to master human life.²

            Zimmerli repeats the importance of history as he

finds it in the mashal. The saying (Aussagewort) appre-

hends the elements of experience, defining and delimiting

them ("establishing them").³ The admonition applies what

is thereby understood to man's life-situation. It tells

him how to behave. It shows him how to gain his life

"with respect for the surrounding world of order, even the

order of the divine world.”⁴ “Wisdom shows man as a being

 

            ¹Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 148; cf. Gerhard

von Rad, "Das Theologische Problem des Alttestamentlichen

Schöpfungsglaubens," in Werden und Wesen des Alten Testa-

ments: Vorträge Gehalten auf der Interhationalen Tagung 

Alttestamentlicher Forscher zu Gottingen vom 4.-10. 

September 1935, ea. Johannes Hempel, Friedrich Stummer, and

Paul Volz, Beihiefte zur Zeitschrift für die Alttestament-

liche Wissenschaft, vol. 66 (Berlin: Alfred Töpelmann,

1936), pp. 138-47.

            ²Zimmerli, "Place and Limit, p. 149; Gese, Lehre

and Wirklichkeit, p. 47.

            ³Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," pp. 150-51.

            ⁴Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 151.

                                                                                                            62

who goes out, who apprehends through his knowledge, who es-

tablishes, who orders the world."¹  "Wisdom seeks to be a

human art of life in the sense of mastering life in the

framework of a given order in this life."²

            Its theology of creation emphasizes the subordina-

tion of the order of the world to the will of Yahweh.

Even Qoheleth operates from the presuppositions of wisdom,

and sets the bounds of wisdom before its creator. The

attempt to master life can turn into utter foolishness

before Yahweh.

            Through his sapiential encounter with the reality of

            the world Ecclesiastes caught sight of the freedom of

            God, who acts and never reacts. He feels this free-

            dom of God as a painful limitation of his own impulse

            to go out into the world by wisdom and to master the

            world. Nevertheless he holds unswervingly fast to

            the creator, who alone has power to allot and to

            dispose of the times.³

Qoheleth sharpens the creation theology and sets the

bounds of anthropocentric wisdom; he accepts what is pos-

sible within those limits.

            Zimmerli rejects any attempt to equate wisdom's

authority with that of apodictic law or prophetic word. A

tension remains between creation theology and the anthro-

 

            ¹Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 150.

            ²Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 155.

            ³Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 157.

                                                                                                            63

pocentric mastery of life; Qoheleth puts this tension in

sharp relief. Wisdom is counsel. The sage convinces the

hearer through argumentative persuasion and by evidence.¹

            Counsel affords a certain margin of liberty and of

            proper decision. Certainly we cannot say that

            counsel has no authority. It has the authority of

            insight. But that is quite different from the

            authority of the Lord, who decrees.

                        So the weighing of the different possibilities

            always belongs to the behaviour of the wise man.²

            Zimmerli seems to reject much of the Egyptian analogy.

In doing so, he restates, with important modifications,

the position he set out earlier. Life-mastery is now

divinely conditioned.

            k) Wisdom as self-understanding in relation-

ship. Like Zimmerli, Crenshaw is suspicious of the at-

tempt to define or redefine wisdom as a system of thought

on the basis of the Egyptian analogy. He argues that,

while the same motifs may appear, the entire context of

any proposed wisdom statement determines the "nuances" of

its meaning. Meaning is inseparable from context.  "Wis-

dom" may serve different analytical purposes, referring to

a literature, a tradition that could be called paideia, or

a system of thought as hiokmāh. Here, Crenshaw moves

 

            ¹Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," pp. 155-58.

            ²Zimmerli, "Place and Limit," p. 153.

                                                                                                            64

toward a typology which he makes part of his definition.¹

            Crenshaw stresses the disparate character of wis-

dom thought. It has many settings and serves many objec-

tives. The conflict we observe over definition may

reflect attempts to bring too much together within the

confines of too narrow an intellectual space. He pro-

poses:

                        Wisdom, then, may be defined as the quest for

            self-understanding in terms of relationships with  

            things, people, and the Creator. This search for

            meaning moves on three levels:  (1) nature wisdom

            which is an attempt to master things for human

            survival and well-being, and which includes the

            drawing up of onomastica and study of natural

            phenomena as they relate to man and the universe;

            (2) juridical and Erfahrungsweisheit (practical

            wisdom), with the focus upon human relationships

            in an ordered society or state; and (3) theo-

            logical wisdom, which moves in the realm of the-

            odicy, and in so doing affirms God as ultimate

            meaning. . . .²

            1) Wisdom as a demythicized will to knowl-

edge. Responding to recent directions in wisdom study,

von Rad presents a revised statement of his views in

Weisheit in Israel. Like Crenshaw, von Rad emphasizes

the secondary position of the term wisdom. It is "ja in

 

            ¹Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-

ence," p. 130, cf. n. 4.

            ²Crenshaw, "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-

ence," p. 132.

                                                                                                            65

den Quellen keineswegs verankert."¹  Rather, it is a

category which has been derived through research and is

subject to revision and redefinition. From Proverbs

1:1-5, he points out the large vocabulary used by the

Hebrews to get at the idea or approach to life which we

have subsumed under a single concept. Von Rad also recog-

nizes that the construction of a social reality, implied

in Jolles' approach to language, cannot be limited to

wisdom. Any social group defines a reality for itself.

Typically, in fact, one is confronted with the demands of

alternative but competing world-views for his allegiance.

While such perspectives have been tested by time for their

stability and their validity, they necessarily simplify

and generalize in their portrayal of "reality" or "what is

so.”²

            A certain self-knowledge, a certain ordering and

interpretation of prior experience, a certain perspective

on the world stands behind every experience of reality.

"Voraussetzungslose Erfahrungen gibt es ja nicht.”³ Since

the experience of counter-realities is a threatening one,

Weltanschauungen alternately struggle against one another

 

            ¹Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 19.

            ²Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, pp. 26, 384.

            ³Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 13.

                                                                                                            66

and seek to encompass conceptually what they do not yet

adequately include. Certainly, "wisdom" is found in the

attempt to order and comprehend experience, and do this

within some literary form. This effort can be found in

virtually every culture. Our dilemma is that we must

either find what commonalities of thought--not just social

methodology--bind together the phenomena we call in the

abstract "wisdom," or we must abandon the term altogether

as some scholars would have us do.¹

            We should recognize that we perceive these phe-

nomena, and our own reality, through highly abstract con-

cepts which the Hebrew did not employ.  His real and im-

mediate world grasped him in a way and with a directness

and intimacy we can only begin to appreciate if we use the

:most meticulous methodology. Von Rad believes that he can

identify elements of thought which unite wisdom and justify

our use of the term.

            We search in vain for some method or some faculty

of the human mind which constituted wisdom for the Hebrew.

Wisdom is a charismatic gift of openness, receptivity,

active awareness of the evidences of a truth inherent in

the created order of the world. It is not some technical

means of manipulated dead matter; that view is strictly

 

            ¹ Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, pp. 13-20.

                                                                                                            67

modern. The wise trust creation and believe it worthy of

that trust. Nevertheless, "Der Weg, wie der Weise zu

seinem Wissen gelangt, bleibt in Dunkeln, aber in einem

verheissungsvollen Dunkel."¹ Without a commitment of

trust, nothing worthwhile can be accomplished. The cre-

ated order, however, rewards trust. He is the fool who

misplaces his trust or withholds it entirely.

            Der "Tor" war doch nicht einfach ein Schwachkopf,

            sondern ein Mensch, der sich gegen eine Wahrheit

            stellte, die ihm in der Schöpfung entgegentrat,

            der sei es aus welchen Gründen, sich einer Ordnung

            nicht anvertraute, die für ihn heilsam wäre, die

            sich aber nun gegen ihn wendet.²    

            The basic human search for knowledge and pattern

in the world (Erkenntniswille) has been cut free of that

spirituality which perceives the world in terms of myth-

ology and immanent powers. For the Hebrew,

            Es handelt sich um einen Erkenntniswillen, der

            eine hellwache Ratio auf entmythisierte Welt

            richtete.  Aber, nur scheinbar kam Israel mit dieser

            Entmythisierung der Welt dem modernen Weltver-

            ständnis nahe, denn dieser radikalen Verweltlichung

            der Welt entsprach die Vorstellung von einem ebenso

            radikalen Durchwaltetsein dieser Welt von Jahwe.

            also die Vorstellung von der Welt als einer

            Schöpfung Jahwes.³

            Von Rad argues that wisdom is discursive and

 

            ¹Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 377.

            ²Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 379.

            ³Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 378.

                                                                                                            68

dialectic. As wisdom thought developed, it became clear

that the impediments and defeats of human life would have

to be reconsidered. Thus, we find a "theologizing of

wisdom." All the old questions are re-ordered in terms of

a new theological groundwork. For the act-consequence-

relationship or synergistic view of life, other wise came

to emphasize the creation, in which Yahweh was hidden from

man and the divine will remained at times only a secret.

Both sides of this discussion agreed that the creation was

the field of divine action within which Yahweh revealed

or concealed himself, his will and his law. The discussion

centered on how to explain an order in which the ordering

will might remain hidden and how to explain a relationship

with Yahweh, who might conceal himself in his creation.

The will to knowledge is common to both.¹

            Wisdom is dialectic in its emphasis on man's re-  

latedness.

            Der Mensch--iminer sing es um den Einzelnen--sah

            sich wie eingebunden in einen Kreis der mannig-

            fachsten Bezugsverhältnisse nach draussen hin, in

            denen er einmal Subjekt, einmal Objekt war.

            Sprachen wie gelegentlich von den Aufbruch des

            Erkenntniswillens Israels auf die Gegenstände seiner

            Umwelt hin, so war das eben dock nur die eine Seite

            der Sache. Ebensogut könnte man sagen, dass sein

            Erkenntniswille einer Provokation gegenüber erst

            antwortete, dass er also erst nachzog, indem er

            sich in der Zwangslage sah, sich auf Verhältnisse,

           

            ¹Von Rad, WeisheöOpfungsglaubens," pp. 138-47.

                                                                                                            69

            ja Bewegungen seiner Umwelt einzustellen, die

            mächtiger waren als der Mensch. . . . Aber diese

            Bewegungen der Umwelt . . . . liefen nicht in

            einem beziehungslosen Draussen nach einem fremden

            Gesetz ab; nein, sie waren dem Menschen in un-

            endlicher Beweglichkeit ganz persönlich zu-

            gekehrt. . .¹

           

            Ohne zu einer Gesamtschaudurchstossen zu können,

            kreiste das Denken der Weisen doch immer um das

            Problem einer Phänomenologie des Menschen.

            Freilich nicht des Menschen an sich, sondern um

            eine Phänomenologie des in seine Umwelt einge-

            bundenen Menschen, in der er sich inner zugleich

            als Subjekt und als Objekt, als aktiv und passiv

            verfand. Ohne diese Umwelt, der er zugekehrt ist,

            und die ihm zugekehrt ist, war in Israel ein

            Menschenverständnis überhaupt nicht möglich.

            Israel kannte nur einen bezogenen Menschen;

            bezogen auf Menschen, auf seine Umwelt, und nicht

            zuletzt auf Gott. Auch die Lehre von der Selbst-

            bezeugung der Schöpfung ist durchaus als ein unge-

            bunden Welt zu verstehen.²

            If man is related to a personally perceived world,

even "nature," this world is not torn by a confrontation

between Yahweh and some personalized evil. Herein lies

Job's problem. He must account for life's evils and

hiddenness within a monistic view that Yahweh stands

within creation. This belief in a related and personal-

ized creation becomes wisdom as it is given verbal and

literary expression on the basis of experience. The

office of the wise man is to formulate his experience and

to communicate it. Thus, in restating his position,

 

            ¹Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 383.

            ²Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel, p. 400.

                                                                                                            70

von Rad takes cognizance of new emphases on order and the

personal nature of creation. He also stresses the role

of subjectivity in the interpretation of experience, a

point important to understanding the relationship between

the wise man and his wisdom.¹

            m) Wisdom as an existential understanding.

Würthwein has detailed the implications of order in the

Egyptian setting that could be applied with qualifications

to Israel.²   Wisdom seeks to comprehend the world of ex-

perience as orderly and intelligible. The existential

understanding or preconception includes:

            1. Das Leben verläuft nach einer bestimmten Ordnung.

            2. Diese Ordnung ist lehr- und lernbar.

            3. Dadurch ist dem Menschen ein Instrument in die

                Hand gegeben, seinen Lebensweg zu bestimmen und

                zu sichern. Denn

            4. Gott selber muss sich nach dieser Ordnung,

                diesem Gesetz richten.³

The last point raises a central issue for Hebrew wisdom:

what is the relationship of Yahweh to the orderliness the

wise seem to have found within their experience?

            In sum, there are clea