Jehovah possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old.
In Proverbs 8, Wisdom speaks in the first person. From verse 22 that voice looks back before creation itself. Two questions have divided readers for centuries. Who is really speaking here? And does "possessed" mean that God made this Wisdom?
Some readers deny that this chapter speaks of Christ at all. They treat Wisdom as one of God's qualities. One writer reports how the objection came up in a discussion:
"As to Proverbs 8, one man was definite, and no one challenged him when he said: 'Wisdom is not Christ... I cannot love Wisdom, it is a quality.'"
Commentators differ. But most answer that Wisdom cannot stay an idea here, because of what Wisdom says and does:
Solomon traces wisdom back to a time when there was no beginning. He writes as if Wisdom were a person speaking: "I was set up [anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning, before the earth was" (chap 8:23). Only One who is God could say this. It is Deity who speaks here. Again, "I love those who love Me, and those who seek Me early will find Me" (v. 17). You can admire a quality. You cannot love a quality. We can love a Person, and in this case rejoice that this wonderful Person loves us.
One verb in this verse has caused centuries of argument. Read one way, it makes Wisdom sound like the first thing God made:
The word "possessed" has also the meaning of "formed". "This word has been a battleground of controversy since the days of the Arian heresy. But it is worth remembering this. Set all theological questions aside: whatever translation we choose, the word cannot mean that wisdom ever had a beginning, or that wisdom was ever created in the strict sense of that word. Wisdom is inseparable from any worthy conception of Him who is 'the only wise God' (1 Tim. 1:17), and therefore is like Him 'from everlasting to everlasting'" (Perowne).
Another writer reaches the same point from where Wisdom stands — with God, and before all His works:
"Jehovah possessed me in the beginning of his way." There was Wisdom, not simply in Him, but with Him. John 1:1 says the same of the Word: "the Word was with God" — and just as surely, He "is God"... "I was set up [lit. anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning before the earth was." He was not a creature God made; He existed before His works.
This is not first about the skill God showed in making the world:
The point here is not that wisdom showed itself in creation (no doubt it did). The point is that wisdom had its place with God before the world existed... No doubt wisdom showed itself when He prepared the heavens and drew a circle on the face of the deep; but wisdom was there before it all.
Wisdom is with God before anything else exists. So the chapter shows one Divine Person delighting in another:
Christ is set before us as the object of Jehovah's daily delight. Scripture presents to our faith, in language fitted to our spiritual understanding, One Divine Person Who finds His delight in Another Divine Person (verse 30).
Some translations read "in the beginning of his way" — the course God was about to take. This verse tells us who stood at the start of it:
Here is One who filled the thoughts of the Creator "in the beginning of His way." The way He was going to take, to carry out the thoughts of His gracious mind, had to do entirely with this Person whom the Lord possessed. So only those who have learned something of Him can trace His way, and no step of that glorious way was taken without Him... Nothing was done without Him. Everything was done with reference to Him.
Another writer explains what God's "way" means:
The first statement is this: Jehovah already possessed this wisdom when His way began — the move to produce anything outside Himself, to reveal Himself.
What begins before creation does not stay there. The chapter runs on to the human race:
Christ was the object of God the Father's delight, as the centre and fullness of all wisdom. In turn, men have been the delight of Christ, and so have the parts of Jehovah's earth where people live. We see Christ in connection with men when we consider Him as uniting and unfolding in Himself every feature of the wisdom and counsels of God.
- A Person — Wisdom loves, calls and rejoices. A quality cannot do those things, and you cannot love a quality back.
- No beginning — writers have argued over "possessed" since the Arian dispute. On any translation, Wisdom never had a start. God is "from everlasting to everlasting," and so is His Wisdom.
- Before the works — Wisdom is not skill shown off in creation. It was already with God when nothing existed to display it in.
- Two Persons — the chapter sets One Divine Person before us as the daily delight of Another. That is John 1:1 in Old Testament words.
- Down to us — God's way began with Christ, and the delight fixed on Him before creation ends up resting on men.
I was set up from eternity, from the beginning, before the earth was.
In this chapter wisdom speaks in the first person, and here that voice reaches back to before the earth existed. The writers quote older translations, which read "from everlasting" where the ESV reads "Ages ago."
The claims made here go far past anything an abstract quality could make. One writer tests them with a simple observation about love.
Solomon traces it back to a time when there was no beginning. He writes as if Wisdom personified were speaking: "I was set up [anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning, before the earth was" (chapter 8:23). This could only be said of One who is God — it is Deity who speaks here. Again, "I love those who love Me, and those who seek Me early shall find Me" (v. 17). You can admire a quality. You cannot love a quality. We can love a Person, and in this case rejoice that this wonderful Person loves us.
Another writer puts the same question to the wording of the verse itself:
How could a mere attribute correct people, demand obedience, give counsel, rejoice before God, or be sinned against? Words like these strongly recall John 1: "The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way before His works of old." "I was set up from everlasting, before the earth was." "When there were no depths I was brought forth!" (vv. 22, 25). Here we have twice the thought of "generation" — "I was brought forth," "I was brought forth." How can we avoid the conclusion that it is the Eternal Son who was then brought forth? Eternal sonship and eternal existence in the past clearly fit together, however much human reason may stumble.
Commentators read "set up" as meaning anointed. One writer follows that word forward into the New Testament.
The Anointed, or Christ, is more than a Jewish title. "Set up" is the same as anointed. He was anointed from everlasting. So He was the Christ in the mind of God in the past eternity. He was the Christ in God's purpose before incarnation. In history He was anointed as Christ at His baptism. And God made Him Lord and Christ, confirming Him as such, in resurrection.
The word "possessed" in verse 22 can also be rendered "formed." People have argued over it for centuries. One writer answers that neither rendering makes wisdom something that began.
Whatever rendering we adopt, the word cannot mean that wisdom ever had a beginning, or was, strictly speaking, ever created. Wisdom cannot be separated from any worthy thought of Him who is "the only wise God" (1 Tim. 1:17). So wisdom is like Him, "from everlasting to everlasting." Wisdom, the Son of God, was always with God from everlasting. Nothing had yet been created. The mountains did not yet stand, and the earth had not been made. He was. And when creation began He was there.
Another writer sets the verse beside the opening of John's Gospel.
Wisdom was not simply in Him, but with Him. John 1:1 says the same of the Word: "the Word was with God" — and just as surely, He "is God." "I was set up [literally, anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning before the earth was." He was no creature of God. He already existed before His works.
Many read this passage as praise for God's skill in making the world. One writer argues the point sits earlier than creation — and that man was already in Wisdom's thoughts.
People often take that passage as celebrating God's wisdom in creation, which every devout mind gladly owns. But that is not its object. It declares that wisdom was in God before creation, before His ways began. "I was set up from everlasting." The statement is that wisdom was there before the earth existed, when there was no creation. What was in the mind of Wisdom, of which the created earth was only the sphere? … Man occupied Wisdom's thought: Wisdom's delight was there.
This wisdom does not stay in eternity past. One writer ties the wisdom that shaped the universe to the way we walk now.
In this wonderful chapter we see wisdom at work in the creation of the universe. It is this same wisdom that is available to us in the passage we are considering. The One who ordered creation rightly for the pleasure of the Godhead presents that same wisdom to us. So we may walk rightly in that creation, for the pleasure of the Godhead.
- Before — the verse reaches back past the earth's beginning to a point where there was no beginning at all. No rendering of the word makes wisdom something that started.
- Beside — wisdom is not described as inside God but with Him, echoing the words about the Word in John 1:1.
- Anointed — "set up" means anointed, so the title Christ reaches back into eternity, long before His baptism.
- A Person — you can admire a quality, but you cannot love one. This speaker loves, gives counsel, rejoices before God, and can be sinned against.
- Available — the same wisdom that ordered the universe is offered to you, to order your own walk.
When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no fountains abounding with water.
This verse sits inside a long speech by Wisdom. She describes her own existence before the seas and the underground springs were there. Two questions follow. Who is this speaker? And what does it mean to be "brought forth" before the depths existed?
The chapter does not describe a quality God has. It presents someone who speaks, corrects, and claims a history older than the world. One writer points to the New Testament to settle who that is:
No honest mind taught by God can doubt that this chapter sets Christ before us. Some say we cannot apply abstract principles to Divine Persons, but Luke 11:49 clearly disproves this: "Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles.'" Here a divine Person is speaking. We can be sure that the voice which speaks as a woman in our passage in Proverbs is the same voice that speaks in Luke 11. God has made divine wisdom available to us in Christ, as we read, "And because of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God" (1 Cor. 1:30).
Another writer asks what a quality on its own could ever do:
How could a mere attribute correct people, demand obedience, give counsel, rejoice before God, or be sinned against?
The verse measures His existence against the oldest things anyone could name: the deep waters and the springs. He stands on the other side of the line from everything that was made.
"I was set up [literally, anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning, before the earth was." He was no creature of God. He already existed before His works. When there were no depths, and no fountains abounding with waters, He was brought forth. This was before the mountains or the hills were settled, and while He had not yet made the earth, or the fields, or the first dust of the world. He was there for the making and ordering of everything, just as He was there before anything.
(Older translations say "fountains" where the ESV says "springs." The verse 23 wording inside the quote, with its bracket, is this writer's own rendering of the Hebrew.)
The Hebrew word behind "brought forth" appears twice in this passage. One writer traces it to other places in the Old Testament, where the same word describes being born.
Here we have the thought of "generation" twice: "I was brought forth," "I was brought forth" (Hebrew chul; see Job 15:7, "Were you brought forth before the hills?" and Psalm 51:5, "I was brought forth in iniquity"). How can we avoid the conclusion that it is the Eternal Son who was then brought forth? Eternal sonship and eternal existence in the past do not contradict each other, however much human reason may stumble.
Verse 22 can be read as "possessed" or as "formed." People have argued over that word for centuries. One writer answers them on their own ground:
This word has been a battleground of controversy since the days of the Arian heresy. But we should remember this, apart from all theological questions. Whichever translation we choose, the word cannot mean that wisdom ever had a beginning, or that wisdom was ever created in the strict sense. You cannot think worthily of Him who is "the only wise God" (1 Tim. 1:17) apart from His wisdom. So His wisdom is like Him, "from everlasting to everlasting."
The list of created things is not scenery.
To press the marvel of this, the passage brings in various works of creation, to show that they are lower than the One who is the wisdom of God and the power of God. So the earth came after Him, and so did "the depths" and "the fountains abounding with water."
It is easy to read the chapter as praise for God's skill in making the world. One writer marks the sharper claim:
Wisdom has brought light into this world of confusion — divine light. But wisdom existed before the world did, in the thoughts and counsels of God, with Christ as the centre of all these counsels and the object of God's delight. … The point here is not that wisdom was displayed in creation (no doubt it was). The point is that, before the world existed, wisdom had its place with God. We have to trace its path in creation, which is now ruined; but God's mind and thought came before it all.
- Person. Wisdom here corrects, counsels and rejoices — things no attribute can do. Commentators identify the Speaker as Christ, who "became to us wisdom from God."
- Before. The depths and the springs are the oldest things imaginable. He is older still — He already existed before God's works, and is not one of them.
- Born, not made. "Brought forth" carries the sense of being born. Writers read it as pointing to the Son, who always existed and was always the Son.
- Contested. People have argued over the wording of verse 22 for centuries. On any translation, it cannot make Wisdom something that began.
- Ahead of everything. God's mind and thought came before the world. The wisdom that planned creation is the wisdom God has made available to us in Christ.
Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth;
Twice in this chapter Wisdom says, "I was brought forth." The measure here is the mountains and hills, and the verse forces one question: is the speaker a quality God has, or a Person who was already there before anything was made?
Commentators point to a change of voice inside the chapter itself. The opening verses report what wisdom does; from verse 12 someone speaks in the first person.
In the first 11 verses the writer reports the actions and words of the woman wisdom. But from verse 12 it is not a report. A Person speaks directly, calling Himself "I Wisdom." This is not just a matter of how we feel; it is a matter of fact. So the emphasis is not on how people are affected, but on truth that is true no matter how it affects men.
What Wisdom does — and how Wisdom speaks of coming forth — points the same way:
How could a mere attribute reprove, demand obedience, counsel, rejoice before God, or be sinned against?... Here we have twice the thought of "generation" — "I was brought forth," "I was brought forth." How can we avoid the conclusion that it is the Eternal Son who was then brought forth? Eternal Sonship and eternal existence in the past clearly go together, however much human reason may stumble.
One writer sets Wisdom beside the Word of John 1, then follows the chapter's list of "befores" from the depths and the hills up to the heavens:
Wisdom was not simply in Him, but with Him, as John 1:1 says of the Word: "the Word was with God," and just as surely He is God. He was no creature of God. He already existed before His works. He was brought forth when there were no depths and no springs full of water. This was before the mountains or hills were set in place, and before God had made the earth, or the fields, or the first dust of the world. He was there for the making and ordering of everything, just as He was there before anything. And He did not come before the lower scene only, but before the heavens that contain all.
"Brought forth" sounds like having a start date, and that troubles readers. The surrounding verses rule it out:
Some object to applying these verses to the Lord Jesus. In verses 24 and 25 Wisdom speaks of being "brought forth," and they suppose this must mean that wisdom did not always exist, while Christ always existed. But this view fails to consider verses 22-23, where Wisdom says that the Lord possessed Him in the beginning of His way, before the earth was. So we cannot take being "set up" or being "brought forth" as a point in time when this happened. Just as He was "set up from eternity," so He was brought forth from eternity.
Commentators differ over the words used for this. A note attached to Grant's article warns against one of his terms:
The author seeks to defend (and rightly so) the truth that Christ was eternally the Son of God. However, the term "only-begotten" should not be taken to imply an idea of eternal generation (which would be a contradiction in terms).
The passage sets one Person beside another before anything existed. That points to a distinction within God Himself:
Here, as in John 1:3, the idea that matter is eternal is refuted. Our Lord, under the figure of Wisdom, comes before all created beings and all created things. God as God is Creator, but Wisdom exists together with Him... The "then" of verse 30 covers both the "before" of verses 22 to 26 and the "when" of verses 27 to 29. So within the uncreated Godhead, divine Persons are revealed to reverent faith. They can be told apart: the One and the Other, the One being the Object of the Other.
The verse is not about age alone. The One who came before the mountains had His eye somewhere else:
Here was a truth more wonderful even than creation. It tells of the divine Associate who brought His Father's plans into being and delighted in them. Yet His eyes were on other objects: "My delights were with the sons of men."
- Person, not principle. From verse 12 a speaker says "I Wisdom." He reproves, counsels and rejoices — things a mere quality cannot do.
- Before. Mountains and hills are the measure. He was there before the depths, the dust and the heavens.
- Brought forth, not begun. Set up from eternity and brought forth from eternity go together. The words mark no date on a calendar. One writer hears in them the voice of the Eternal Son; commentators differ over the term to use.
- Two, not one alone. One divine Person is the delight and Object of Another before any creature existed.
- Toward us. The One older than the mountains already delighted in people. Creation's Associate had His eye on us.
while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the beginning of the dust of the world.
Wisdom is speaking here, and she dates herself. She was there before the soil, before the open fields, before even the first speck of dust in the world. So who can speak like this — a quality of God, or a Person? That is the question this verse forces, and the answer settles who the Speaker is.
From the first chapter on, wisdom speaks and cries out. One writer traces that voice to its full height here.
One mark of this book, and it fits its contents exactly, is that "wisdom" is spoken of as a person from the first chapter. That rises, as is well known, to the Person of Christ in Proverbs 8:22-31. Even in this first mention the form of the word is plural, as in Proverbs 9:1 and later on. Yet the cry does not fail. As it goes on, it takes on the seriousness of a divine warning of certain judgment. So it is hard to separate it from the voice of God Himself.
Verse 26 reaches back past the raw material of the planet. The same writer ties that "before" to a "there".
When there were no depths, and no springs abounding with water, He was brought forth. That was before the mountains or hills were settled in place, and before He had made the earth with its fields, or the first of the dust of the world. He was there for the making and ordering of everything, just as He was before anything. And He did not come before this lower scene only. He came before the heavens too, which contain it all.
The earth, the fields, the first dust — this list is not a nature poem. Each item is named to place it under Someone.
To press home the wonder of this, the writer brings in various works of creation, to show that they are lower than Him who is the wisdom of God and the power of God. So the earth came after Him, and so did "the depths" and "the springs abounding with water," the mountains, the hills, the fields, and the first dust of the world (vv. 23-26).
If dust itself had a starting point, matter is not eternal. And the One who is older than dust is not a made thing. One writer draws both conclusions.
Here, as in John 1:3, the idea that matter is eternal is disproved. Our Lord, under the figure of Wisdom, comes before all created beings and all created things. God as God is Creator, but Wisdom exists alongside Him, anointed from eternity (v. 23). This wonderful Scripture is worth studying closely. Christ is looked at as the daily delight of Jehovah… The "then" of that verse covers both the "before" of verses 22 to 26 and the "when" of verses 27 to 29.
Another writer says the same thing plainly. Wisdom was not God's first and finest product:
This does not mean at all that He was created as the first and highest of God's creatures. Nor that He is something that flowed out from the Godhead. No!… The passage in Proverbs 8 speaks about God's wisdom. It cannot be used to suggest that Wisdom is God's work in creation. On the contrary, it was always there in God Himself, from the beginning (Prov. 8:23).
Many readers take these verses as praise for God's skill in building the world. One writer answers that the subject is what was in God before any building began.
The aim of that passage is not to celebrate the wisdom of God in creation, as people often suppose — though every godly mind gladly owns that wisdom. It declares that wisdom was in God before creation, before His ways began… Before the earth existed, wisdom was there. That is the statement, made when there was no creation at all. What was in the mind of Wisdom, for which the created earth was only the setting?
Being first in time is only half of it. The verse's "before" carries a purpose with it.
Before the mountains, before the hills, before the earth, He was brought forth… "then I was beside Him." Nothing was done without Him. Everything was done with reference to Him. All wisdom centres in Him. This earth carries the stamp of the wisdom that lives in Him — and not this earth only. The whole universe, all the worlds, however many there are, were formed by His understanding.
- Before — the verse reaches back past the fields and past the first dust. Nothing material is older than the Speaker.
- Person — the wisdom that speaks here is not an abstract quality. It is traced to the Person of Christ, and the voice is hard to separate from God's own.
- Uncreated — dust had a beginning; He did not. So He is no creature, matter is not eternal, and wisdom was always in God Himself.
- Present — He came before creation, and He was there for the making and ordering of all of it, heavens included.
- Purpose — the chapter is not admiring God's skill in building the world. It shows what filled God's mind before He built, and that everything was done with reference to Him.
When he prepared the heavens I was there; when he ordained the circle upon the face of the deep;
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
when he established the skies above, when the fountains of the deep became strong;
Proverbs 8 has Wisdom speaking in the first person. Here the speaker lists moments in the making of the world and claims to have been present at each one. Two questions follow. Who is speaking? And why does it matter that this speaker was there before anything existed?
The chapter never names its speaker. Writers find the answer by setting the claim beside the New Testament.
And who speaks like this? Who is the One who can say, "I was there"? It is the voice of Wisdom in Proverbs 8 which speaks. It is concerning Jesus that the Spirit of God writes in John 1. What is true of Wisdom in Proverbs is true of Jesus in John. In 1 Corinthians 1:24 Jesus is specifically called the "Wisdom of God."
The verse names two things that seem least likely to keep to a boundary: cloud and water. Older versions read "clouds" and "strengthened" where the ESV has "skies" and "established."
When God prepared the heavens, He was there. He was there too "when he drew a circle on the face of the deep," plainly making the sea keep to the limits God set (v. 27). He established the clouds. They may seem to have no set limits, but God keeps them within such limits. He also "strengthened the fountains of the deep," though we may understand little of what that involves (v. 28).
The "when" clauses do more than place the speaker at the scene. They settle who existed first.
"I was set up [literally, anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning before the earth was." He was no creature of God. He existed before His works. When there were no depths and no springs full of water, He was brought forth, before mountains or hills were settled. He was there for the making and ordering of all, as He was before any. And He came before more than this lower scene. He came before the heavens that contain everything.
Some read Wisdom here as a picture of one of God's qualities, not a Person. The rest of the chapter answers that.
Scripture shows the Godhead at work in creation. We have Jehovah and an abstract quality. We may ask: did Jehovah make an abstract quality the cherished child of His love? How could an abstract quality rejoice before Him, and how could that abstract quality rejoice with the sons of men? Creation was for the Son. We see the power, wisdom and goodness of God planning, measuring and decreeing, but in holy love He is rejoicing. Love and joy suppose moral beings and not merely material things or abstract qualities.
Others press the same point by asking what this Wisdom is said to do, and by listening for the echo of John 1.
How could a mere attribute reprove, demand obedience, counsel, rejoice before God, or be sinned against? Such words strongly recall the statements of John 1: "The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way before His works of old." "I was set up from everlasting, before the earth was." "When there were no depths I was brought forth."
The speaker was not only present when the work was done. The work was done for Him.
Before the mountains, before the hills, before the earth, He was brought forth. When He established the clouds above, when He strengthened the fountains of the deep, when He gave to the sea His decree, when He appointed the foundations of the earth, "then I was by Him." Nothing was done without Him. Everything was done with reference to Him. All wisdom centres in Him.
Verse 28 is a clause, not a full sentence. It waits for the "then" of verse 30, and that "then" is where the chapter is heading.
This wonderful Scripture repays examination. Christ is seen as the daily delight of Jehovah, distinct from Him. In language fitted to our spiritual understanding, Holy Scripture sets before our faith One Divine Person who delights in Another Divine Person as a distinct Object. Take verse 30. Its "then" covers both the "before" of verses 22 to 26 and the "when" of verses 27 to 29.
- Speaker. Writers identify the Wisdom who says "I was there" with Christ, whom 1 Corinthians 1:24 calls the "Wisdom of God."
- Before. He existed before God's works. He was no creature, but was there before depths, mountains and heavens.
- During. Nothing in creation was done without Him, and everything was done with reference to Him.
- Boundaries. God holds even clouds and deep springs, which appear to run free, inside limits He set.
- Then. All these "when" clauses lead to one "then" — the Person who was by Him, His daily delight.
when he imposed on the sea his decree that the waters should not pass his commandment, when he appointed the foundations of the earth
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
then I was by him [his] nursling, and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him;
In Proverbs 8, a voice called Wisdom speaks about the time before the world existed. Verse 30 is the heart of that speech: a Person standing beside God, and God's daily delight. Who is this speaker, and what does an eternity of shared joy have to do with us?
The chapter is not describing a quality God has. Someone is speaking here, and the New Testament gives us the name.
The New Testament confirms who Wisdom is. "Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God" (1 Cor. 1:30). We have the key to Proverbs 8 in our knowledge of the Lord Jesus, the one great Mediator between God and men... "to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God" (1 Cor. 1:24).
The verse places Wisdom by God. That small word holds two Persons together and keeps them distinct. It also rules out any idea that this speaker had a beginning.
"The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way." Wisdom was not simply in Him, but with Him. John 1:1 says the same of the Word: "the Word was with God." And He "is God" just as surely... "I was set up [literally, anointed] from everlasting, from the beginning before the earth was." He was no creature of God, but was in being before His works.
Translators have taken the Hebrew phrase two ways, and commentators differ over which is better. One reading hears tenderness in it: the cherished child at the Father's side.
When God appointed the foundations of the earth, the verse says, "Then I was by Him, as one brought up with Him." This means "the nursling of His love" (J.N.D.). Divine tenderness and deep affection were there even before God appointed the strong and solid foundations of the earth. There is a parallel to this expression in the New Testament — "the Son of His love" (Col. 1:13).
The other reading is the one the ESV follows: "like a master workman." It makes Him the craftsman of all that was built. The surprise is that He stands by the Creator instead of working alone.
Come to the truth about the greatness of the Son of Man, and we find that He is the Creator Himself. He made all things (John 1; Col. 1; Heb. 1). And yet this passage sets Him "by" the Creator, when He made the heavens and the earth. The reason for this, I have no doubt, is that here He is viewed only as the Man of God's purposes... "As one brought up with Him" appears in the Revised Version as "a master workman" (v. 30), and elsewhere as "His artificer." I am persuaded the meaning is this: everything was created with a view to Christ taking it under His control as Man, on the ground of redemption.
The verse shows delight running both ways. God delights in Wisdom, and Wisdom rejoices before Him. No human thinker reached that view of God on his own.
Here we read of two Persons — one is Wisdom — who enjoy an eternal and mutual flow of affection. It must be so. Never in all the searching of philosophy did men like Socrates or Plato reach such a height. Then a simple fisherman, called from his boat and nets by the Sea of Galilee, wrote three words. The greatest philosopher never dreamed of them: "God is love" (1 John 4:16).
What verse 30 says of eternity, God later said out loud where people could hear it.
Creation's many amazing wonders came about while Christ, the Wisdom of God, was with the Father. He was there as a "Master Craftsman," bringing all things into being (v. 30). He was daily God's delight, rejoicing always before Him. God's words from heaven confirmed this on two occasions: when John the Baptist baptized the Lord Jesus, and when He was transfigured on the holy mountain.
The second half of the verse says Wisdom was not only loved but rejoicing. Believers share that same joy before God, but on different terms.
There was divine delight in this wisdom, seen here fully as a person. And He too was ever rejoicing before God at all times. This object of God's delight was rejoicing before Him. In a lesser way, and by grace, we are "holy and blameless before Him in love." But here it was an eternal and divine object — what was in the Godhead itself, yet with God as a distinct object before Him.
- Delight identified — the Wisdom speaking here is Christ, called the wisdom of God in 1 Corinthians. This chapter gives us a Person, not a principle.
- Delight eternal — He was with God, not made by Him: anointed from everlasting, in being before any of God's works.
- Delight mutual — two Persons in an unending exchange of affection. A fisherman put it into three words: "God is love."
- Delight declared — God had this delight in Him before creation, and spoke it aloud at His baptism and on the mountain of transfiguration.
- Delight shared — He rejoiced before God by right; we stand holy and blameless before Him in love by grace.
rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth, and my delights [were] with the sons of men.
Wisdom has just traced herself back before the world began, standing beside God as He formed the earth. Now her joy turns outward — to the world people live in, and to people themselves. Who is this speaker? And why would an eternal Being delight in us?
The chapter presents Wisdom as a woman speaking, but writers see a Person behind the figure.
The fact that the speaker is a woman need not trouble us. When Scripture pictures truth through a woman, it is to present divine principles in their inward character. No honest mind taught by God can doubt that this chapter sets Christ before us. Some have argued that we cannot apply abstract principles to Divine Persons, but Luke 11:49 disproves it: "Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles.'" Here a divine Person is speaking.
The words "his earth" point the same way. The speaker claims to own the planet.
HIS earth! Whose? Evidently the One who speaks. Who can call the earth HIS earth, but the Creator Himself? And who has shown His delight in the sons of men but the Lord Jesus? Who has died that men might live? Christ! So we read, "because of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God" (1 Cor. 1:30).
The verse narrows twice: from the whole creation to the inhabited world, then to people. That narrowing is deliberate.
A wise God did order the creation, yet wisdom was fixed on something else — man was the object in view. That wisdom, whose joy was before God, and who was God's delight and joy, did not delight in the earth but in the parts of it where people would live. There was purpose in this. Man is a poor, trivial part of creation if he is only a creature — small against the vast scene he moves in. Yet he is the centre of all God's purposes, the object of His thought before creation.
The rejoicing in the earlier lines is between Wisdom and Jehovah alone. What is startling is that we are allowed to overhear it.
We are carried back into the past eternity, where infinitely sufficing to each other, Wisdom was with Jehovah, the Son with the Father… What perfect mutuality of divine joy, but in which the Son was absolutely alone with the Father, none else to know, much less to enter into it. Yet we are given to understand what occupied their thoughts in this communion. "Before him, rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth" — while as yet He had not made the earth — "and my delights were with the sons of men." Who could have conceived it, that in the ineffable joy of such divine communion, we should find the intimation of our place in the comprehension of the purposes of God as the objects of His delight.
This delight came before the earth, so nothing people did produced it. Where does it find its answer?
Before the second verse of Genesis 1, or even the first, God's heart was going out to the parts of the earth where people would live. What a word for us! It passes all we can understand — His delights with the sons of men! Where shall we look for these thoughts to be carried out? Not in the history of the first man. It is in the second Man, already before Him in His eternal counsels.
Writers link this verse forward to Bethlehem. There the heavenly hosts sang, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!" (ESV)
This is not Christ glorified on high, and so it is not our union with Him as His body. Still, it is an expression of divine love in man and toward man, far beyond anything Israel ever knew. It will be seen in the days of the kingdom here below, when He reigns and all the families of the earth are blessed in Him. For it is divine delight in Him whose delights were, and will be, with the sons of men. So the praise of the heavenly hosts at His birth is beautiful, heard at night by the lowly shepherds. It is beautiful in itself, and beautiful in their delight, free of jealousy, in the ways of Him who made men, not angels, the special object of His pleasure.
One more surprise: look at who these people were.
The love between the Father and the Son is divine, and so completely happy and satisfied, if we may say so. The Son was daily His Father's delight, and rejoiced always before Him. Yet that divine love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit wanted to go beyond itself, and to show itself outside itself… But the vast range into which that love had spread was to hold, as its special objects, children of disobedience, enemies of God. This is what makes that love so truly divine, and is its highest glory.
- Speaker. Wisdom here is a Person, not an idea — Christ, who calls the planet "His earth" because He made it.
- Direction. The joy narrows from creation, to the inhabited world, to people. Man was the object in view — the centre of all God's purposes.
- Timing. God set this delight before the earth existed. Nothing we did produced it, and nothing we do can be its cause.
- Fulfilment. Not the first man's history, but the second Man, brings it about. Angels announced it at His birth, glad — not jealous — that God chose men and not them.
- Reach. The love between Father and Son was already complete. It still went outside itself and settled on enemies. That is where its highest glory shows.