In order to support the traditional Christian view of the relationship of Jesus to the Father, we must understand the background for certain claims about the nature and identity of Jesus in the New Testament. Our general argument may be outlined as follows:

 Jesus, as God's Word and Wisdom, was and is eternally an attribute of God the Father. Just as our own words and thoughts come from us and cannot be separated from us, so it is that Jesus cannot be completely separate from the Father. But there is more to this explanation, related to the distinction between functional subordination and ontological equality. We speak of Christ as the "Word" of God, God's "speech" in living form. In Hebrew and Ancient Near Eastern thought, words were not merely sounds, or letters on a page; words were things that "had an independent existence and which actually did things." Throughout the Old Testament and in the Jewish intertestamental Wisdom literature, the power of God's spoken word is emphasized (Ps. 33:6, 107:20; Is. 55:11; Jer. 23:29; 2 Esd. 6:38; Wisdom 9:1). "Judaism understood God's Word to have almost autonomous powers and substance once spoken; to be, in fact, 'a concrete reality, a veritable cause.'" (Richard N. Longenecker, The Christology of Early Jewish Christianity , 145.) But a word did not need to be uttered or written to be alive. A word was defined as "an articulate unit of thought, capable of intelligible utterance." (C. H. Dodd, Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, 263. It cannot therefore be argued that Christ attained existence as the Word only "after" he was "uttered" by God. Some of the second-century church apologists followed a similar line of thinking, supposing that Christ the Word was unrealized potential within the mind of the Father prior to Creation.) This agrees with Christ's identity as God's living Word, and points to Christ's functional subordination (just as our words and speech are subordinate to ourselves) and his ontological equality (just as our words represent our authority and our essential nature) with the Father. A subordination in roles is within acceptable Biblical and creedal parameters, but a subordination in position or essence (the "ontological" aspect) is a heretical view called subordinationism.

Background: The background with Wisdom Christology is found in the concept of hypostasis. What is a hypostasis? Broadly defined, it is a quasi-personification of attributes proper to a deity, occupying an intermediate position between personalities and abstract beings. In the ANE here are some examples:

Hu and Sia, in Egyptian tradition the creative word and understanding of Re-Atum

Ma'at, also Egyptian, a personification of right order in nature and society, a creation of Re

Mesaru and Kettu, or Righteousness and Right, Akkadian hypostases conceived of as qualities of the sun-god, or as gifts granted by him, or sometimes as personal beings or independent deities

the divine word, which proceeds via the character of breath and wind, in Sumerian and Akkadian literature

Wisdom in Proverbs 8, and Wisdom in Sirach and Wisdom of Solomon, and Philo's logos, all fit hand in glove with these. Now let's look at some cites, starting with Prov. 8.

Proverbs 8:22-30 The LORD possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth: When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep: When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth: Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him...

This passage is one of several in the Old Testament (see Ps. 58:10, 107:42; Job 11:14) in which abstract qualities are personified, following an Ancient Near Eastern tradition of personification. (Derek Kidner, The Wisdom of Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes, 44.) Here, and in other parts of Proverbs, Wisdom "makes claims for herself which are elsewhere made only by, or for, God." The verb used by Wisdom to call attention to its messages is the same used by the prophets to call for returning to God in repentance. (R. N. Whybray, Proverbs, 44) The speech made by Wisdom in this chapter is "a lengthy self-recommendation in which (Wisdom) boasts of her power and authority and of the gifts she is able to bestow," following a known Ancient Near Eastern literary genre in which a divinity praises itself. "Wisdom is intended to be understood as an attribute or heavenly servant of the sole God Yahweh to whom he has delegated certain powers with regard to his relations with mankind." Finally, to complete the picture, Proverbs 2:6 tells us, "For the LORD giveth wisdom: out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding." God is the source of Wisdom; Wisdom is one of God's characteristics and attributes. (Bruce Vawter, "Proverbs 8:22: Wisdom and Creation," Journal of Biblical Literature 99/2 (1980): 205-216, argues that Proverbs 8 depicts Wisdom as a separate deity that Yahweh "acquired." I follow Hurtado in replying that "this language of personification [used in Judaism as a whole] does not necessarily reflect a view of these divine attributes as independent entities alongside God." Such personifications "must be understood within the context of the ancient Jewish concern for the uniqueness of God, the most controlling religious idea of ancient Judaism." Thus he regards claims like that of Vawter's, that Wisdom here is depicted as an "independent deity," as something that is "simply unwarranted and imports into such passages connotations never intended by the writers." Larry W. Hurtado, One God, One Lord: Early Christian Devotion and Ancient Jewish Monotheism, 46-7. For more on this verb, see here.)

We will now examine Jewish speculations that accorded "the Wisdom of God" a quasi-personal status. We will then be able to see a continuity between the intertestamental literature and the New Testament that defines the nature of the relationship between God the Father and Jesus Christ. Dunn puts it succinctly: "What pre-Christian Judaism said of Wisdom and Philo also of the Logos, Paul and the others say of Jesus. The role that Proverbs, ben Sira, etc. ascribe to Wisdom, these earliest Christians ascribe to Jesus." James D. G. Dunn, Christology in the Making , 167. This conception of Wisdom parallels a less significant, general Jewish explanation of how a transcendent God could participate in a temporal creation. The Aramaic Targums resolved this problem by equating God with His Word: thus in the Targums, Exodus 19:17, rather than saying the people went out to meet God, says that the people went out to meet the word of God, or Memra. This term became a periphrasis for God; whether it could have been reckoned as a separate person, as in Christian Trinitarianism, is a matter of debate. The risk involved with making Wisdom/Word an independent deity was too great for the rabbis to speculate further, but Christians found in the Wisdom tradition an ideal categorical conception within which to place the person of Jesus. N.T. Wright observes in Who Was Jesus? [48-9] that Jewish monotheism "was never, in the Jewish literature of the crucial period, an analysis of the inner being of God, a kind of numerical statement about, so to speak, what God was like on the inside." Rather, it was "always a polemical statement directed outwards against the pagan nations." Rabbis of Jesus' time had no difficulty in personifying separate aspects of God's personality - His Wisdom, His Law (Torah), His Presence (Shekinah), and His Word (Memra), for example. This division had the philosophical purpose of "get(ting) around the problem of how to speak appropriately of the one true God who is both beyond the created world and active within it."

Similarly, Brad Young writes:

Within Judaism, the 'hypostatization' of Wisdom or Torah did not seem to undermine monotheism, since ultimately it was a kind of periphrasis used to circumvent the implication of direct contact between the transcendent God and the creation.

This concept, Young continues, did not challenge God's "ultimate originality and sovereignty" at all. Hence, the idea of Christianity identifying an actual person in such a way is not problematic for monotheism in any sense. Nor is a trinitarian concept entirely foreign to Judaism. O'Neill [JCO.WD, 94] records the words of the Jewish historian Philo, a contemporary of Jesus, who laid out this exposition upon the three men who came to visit Abraham in Genesis 18:2, and were presumed to be divine figures:

...the one in the middle is the Father of the Universe, who in the sacred scriptures is called by his proper name, I am that I am; and the beings on each side are those most ancient powers which are always close to the living God, one of which is called his creative power, and the other his royal power.

No one would question that Philo was a Jewish monotheist; yet here we have an exposition perfectly compatible with the Trinity: the Father, The Creative Power (the Son, or the Word), and the Royal Power (the Holy Spirit). Similarly, in the apocryphal Baruch 4:22, we read:

For I have set hope for your salvation on the Eternal One; and joy has come to me from the Holy One, at the mercy which will soon be present for you from your Eternal Saviour.

Now we move to passages concerned directly with Wisdom.

Ecclesiasticus 1:1-4 All wisdom cometh from the Lord, and is with him for ever. The sand of the sea, and the drops of the rain, And the days of eternity who shall number? The height of the heaven and the breadth of the earth And the deep and wisdom, who shall search them out? Wisdom hath been created before all things, And the understanding of prudence from everlasting.

The book of Ecclesiasticus was written by Jesus the son of Sirach in about 100 B.C. It describes Wisdom as having been "created before all things," as being "from everlasting" and as comparable to "the days of eternity." In this we are in harmony with the Trinitarian view of Jesus as created or generated by the Father eternally, that is, finding his source in the Father and having no existence apart from Him, yet also having existed eternally as God does. Sirach writes further:

I came forth from the mouth of the Most High, And covered the earth as a mist. I dwelt in high places, And my throne is in the pillar of the cloud. Alone I compassed the circuit of the heaven, And walked in the depth of the abyss. (Ecclesiasticus 24:3-5)

He created me from the beginning of the world, And to the end I shall not fail. (Ecclesiasticus 24:4)

This is another speech of self-praise of the sort found in Proverbs, only this time, the speech takes place in the heavenly court -- a place where only God would offer self-praise. Wisdom says of herself: "I came forth from the mouth of the Most High" (the "Word" of God) and "my throne was in the pillar of the cloud" -- an allusion to the Old Testament sign of the divine presence. Wisdom also says that it has "encircled the vault of heaven, and walked in the depths of the abyss...ruled over the waves of the sea and over all the earth, and over every people and nation." In the book of Job (12, 28), these things are what God asks whether Job can do, with the implication that only God can do them.

Finally, Sirach says, "(God) searches out both the deep and the heart, and he perceives all their cunning devices. For the Most High knows all, and he sees the signs of the age. He declares changes that occur, and reveals the searching out of hidden things. He does not lack insight, and nothing escapes him. The might of his wisdom he measures out, He is the same from eternity. Nothing is added and nothing is withdrawn, and there is no need for anyone to instruct him." (42:18-21) Wisdom is an attribute of God, and is co-eternal with Him -- otherwise, Wisdom is a thing "added" to Him, or someone has "instructed" Him. Bauckham makes a similar observation concerning a much later passage: "2 Enoch 33:4, in an echo of Deutero-Isaiah (Isa. 40:13), says that God had no advisor in his work of creation, but that his Wisdom was his advisor. The meaning is clearly that God had no one to advise him. His Wisdom, who is not someone else but intrinsic to his own identity, advised him." Richard Bauckham, God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament , 21.

The Wisdom of Solomon: In this intertestamental work written under the persona of Solomon, Wisdom is described as the artificer of all things (7:22), "the breath of the power of God and a pure effluence flowing from the Almighty" (7:25), and is spoken of as the "image" (eikon -- for the significance of this term, see Chapter 1 of my book, The Mormon Defenders) of the goodness of God (7:26), able to do all things and make all things new. "Wisdom" was also envisioned as sharing God's throne, having been present with God from all eternity, and was thought of as proceeding from God. God's Wisdom and Word are equated in verse 9:2 -- "O God of my fathers, the Lord of mercy, who hast made all things with thy word, and ordained men through thy wisdom." Wisdom is also credited with performing miracles, like the parting of the Red Sea (Wisdom of Solomon 10:18-19).

Philo. The Jewish philosopher Philo was a contemporary of Jesus and the author of several philosophical and historical works. Philo calls Wisdom (which he also refers to as the logos) the "image (eikon) of God," refers to the Wisdom of God as the one through whom the universe came into being, and describes Wisdom as God's "firstborn son," as neither unbegotten like God or begotten like men, as Light and as "the very shadow of God." He regarded the logos as one of several attributes of God which he referred to collectively as "powers," with the logos as the chief power in the hierarchy.

Now that we have concluded our brief survey of Jewish intertestamental literature, some observations are in order before proceeding to the New Testament evidence. As we will show, what these writers said of Wisdom, the authors of the New Testament also said about Christ. But we are not necessarily arguing for direct dependence by Paul or John or any New Testament writer on Philo or any particular writer. Rather, we are establishing that there existed in Judaism certain set motifs about Wisdom with which the writers of the New Testament worked, and that, as Hurtado (44, 46) puts it, "ancient Judaism provided the first Christians with a crucial conceptual category" that was applied to the risen and exalted Jesus. We will now show that Jesus identified himself with Wisdom, and thereby identified himself with its qualities, including co-eternality, functional subordination, and ontological equality with God.

Matthew 8:20//Luke 9:58 Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.

Witherington notes that the image of this saying "had been used earlier of Wisdom having no place to dwell until God assigned her such a place (cf. Sir. 24:6-7 to 1 Enoch 42:2), with Enoch speaking of the rejection of Wisdom ('but she found no dwelling place')." Witherington also notes the parallel to Sirach 36:31, "So who can trust a man that has no nest, but lodges wherever night overtakes him?" The use of these allusions "suggests that Jesus envisions and articulates his experience in light of sapiential traditions..." (Jesus Quest, 188)

Matthew 11:16-19//Luke 7:31-2 To what, then, can I compare the people of this generation? What are they like? They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling out to each other: "'We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not cry.'"For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, 'He has a demon. 'The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and "sinners."' But wisdom is proved right by all her children."

Proverbs 1:24-28 Wisdom calls aloud in the street, she raises her voice in the public squares; at the head of the noisy streets she cries out, in the gateways of the city she makes her speech: "How long will you simple ones love your simple ways? How long will mockers delight in mockery and fools hate knowledge? If you had responded to my rebuke, I would have poured out my heart to you and made my thoughts known to you. But since you rejected me when I called and no one gave heed when I stretched out my hand, since you ignored all my advice and would not accept my rebuke, I in turn will laugh at your disaster; I will mock when calamity overtakes you-- when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when disaster sweeps over you like a whirlwind, when distress and trouble overwhelm you. "Then they will call to me but I will not answer; they will look for me but will not find me.

This passage provides some important clues once we have the social data in hand, and add in the factor of Jesus' communal meals with the dregs of society. Witherington notes passages like Proverbs 9:1-6, "which speaks of a feast set by Wisdom herself where she invites very unlikely guests to the table" for the sake of helping them acquire wisdom. Witherington therefore argues that Jesus dined with sinners and tax collectors because he was "acting out the part of Wisdom." (187-8)

Matthew 11:29-30 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Sirach 6:19-31 Come to (Wisdom) like one who plows and sows. Put your neck into her collar. Bind your shoulders and carry her...Come unto her with all your soul, and keep her ways with all your might...For at last you will find the rest she gives...Then her fetters will become for you a strong defense, and her collar a glorious robe. Her yoke is a golden ornament, and her bonds a purple cord.

Sirach 51:26 Put your neck under the yoke, and let your soul receive instruction: she is hard at hand to find .

Jesus is clearly alluding to the passages in the very popular work of Sirach. His listeners would have recognized that he was associating himself with Wisdom.

Matthew 12:42//Luke 11:31 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom, and now one greater than Solomon is here.

Noting the association of Solomon with the Wisdom literature, Witherington writes (186, 192):

If it is true that Jesus made a claim that something greater than Solomon was present in and through his ministry, one must ask what it could be...Surely the most straightforward answer would be that Wisdom had come in person.

Matthew 23:34//Luke 11:49 Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city... Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute...

In Matthew's version, Jesus says, "I will send them prophets..." Luke specifically identified Jesus with Wisdom.

The Gospel of John identifies Jesus with Wisdom in a number of ways. Jesus speaks in long discourses characteristic of Wisdom (Prov. 8, Sir. 24, Wisdom of Solomon 1-11). John's emphasis on "signs" mirrors that of the Wisdom of Solomon, and John uses the same Greek word for them (semeion). Finally, John's overwhelming use of the term "Father" (115 times) matches the emphasis on that title in the late Wisdom literature.

John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

The prologue to John's gospel makes a precise identification of Christ with Wisdom, describing the Logos' Christological role (1:3), its role as the ground of human knowledge (1:9) and as the mediator of special revelation (1:14) -- the three roles of the pre-existent Logos/Wisdom. In calling Jesus God's Logos, John was affirming Jesus' eternality and ontological oneness with the Father by connecting him with the Wisdom tradition.

Now consider these parallels with John's prologue and the Wisdom literature:

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Wisdom of Solomon 9:9 With you (God) is Wisdom, who knows your works and was present when you made the world.

John 1:4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

Proverbs 8:35 For whoso findeth me findeth life, and shall obtain favour of the LORD.

John 1:11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not. (1:11)

1 Enoch 42:2 Wisdom went forth to make her dwelling among the children of men, and found no dwelling place.

John 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

Sirach 24:8 The one who created me assigned a place for my tent. And he said: 'Make your dwelling in Jerusalem.'

John 6:27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.

Wisdom of Solomon 16:26 On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval. So that your children, whom you loved, O Lord, might learn that it is not the production of crops that feeds humankind but that your word sustains those who trust in you.

John 14:15 If you love me, you will obey what I command.

Wisdom of Solomon 16:18 And love of Wisdom is the keeping of her laws, and giving heed to her laws is assurance of immortality.

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The Word was in the beginning (John 1:1)
Wisdom was in the beginning (Prov. 8:22-23, Sir. 1:4, Wis. 9:9)
The Word was with God (John 1:1)
Wisdom was with God (Prov. 8:30, Sir. 1:1, Wis. 9:4)
The Word was cocreator (John 1:1-3)
Wisdom was cocreator (Prov. 3:19, 8:25; Is. 7:21, 9:1-2)
The Word provides light (John 1:4, 9)
Wisdom provides light (Prov. 8:22, Wis. 7:26, 8:13; Sir. 4:12)
Word as light in contrast to darkness (John 1:5)
Wisdom as light in contrast to darkness (Wis. 7:29-30)
The Word was in the world (John 1:10)
Wisdom was in the world (Wis. 8:1, Sir. 24:6)
The Word was rejected by its own (John 1:11)
Wisdom was rejected by its own (Sir. 15:7)
The Word was received by the faithful (John 1:12)
Wisdom was received by the faithful (Wis. 7:27)
Christ is the bread of life (John 6:35)
Wisdom is the bread or substance of life (Prov. 9:5, Sir. 15:3, 24:21, 29:21; Wis. 11:4)
Christ is the light of the world (John 8:12)
Wisdom is light (Wis. 7:26-30, 18:3-4)
Christ is the door of the sheep and the good shepherd (John 10:7, 11, 14)
Wisdom is the door and the good shepherd (Prov. 8:34-5, Wis. 7:25-7, 8:2-16; Sir. 24:19-22)
Christ is life (John 11:25)
Wisdom brings life (Prov. 3:16, 8:35, 9:11; Wis. 8:13)
Christ is the way to truth (John 14:6)
Wisdom is the way (Prov. 3:17, 8:32-34; Sir. 6:26)

The letters of Paul continue the identification of Jesus with God's Wisdom. 1 Corinthians 1:24, 30 is the most clear: Christ is explicitly identified as "the power of God and the wisdom of God." Elsewhere in 1 Cor. of relevance:

Colossians 1:15-18 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.

This passage is full of allusions to the Wisdom literature. Note the following parallels:

Colossians 1:15a He is the image of the invisible God...

Wisdom of Solomon 7:26 (Wisdom is) a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness.

Colossians 1:15b ...the firstborn over all creation.

Philo's reference to Wisdom as the "firstborn son" and offspring of God.

Colossians 1:16a ...by him all things were created..

Wisdom of Solomon 1:14 "for he created all things that they might exist"

Sirach 1:4 and Philo refer to Wisdom as the "master workman" of creation.

Colossians 1:17b He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Wisdom of Solomon 1:7 ...that which holds all things together knows what is said...

The book of Hebrews, while never identifying Jesus directly as Wisdom, does indicate an equivalence. In verse 3 the rare Greek term apaygasma is used to describe Jesus as the "brightness of God's glory," just as the word is used in Wisdom of Solomon (7:25-26) to describe Wisdom's radiance. Hebrews ascribes to Jesus the same functions that the Philonic/Alexandrian Wisdom literature assigned to Wisdom: mediator of divine revelation, agent and sustainer of creation, and reconciler of God and man (Wisdom of Solomon 7:21-8:1).

Hebrews also says of Jesus what Philo says of the Logos. Philo referred to Wisdom as the "charakter of the eternal Word" just as Hebrews uses this term of Jesus. Hebrews also "asserts the superiority of Jesus over a group of individuals and classes that served mediatorial functions in Alexandrian thought," including angels, Moses, Melchizidek, and the high priest. Finally, in Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom, though universal in scope, by God's decree rests in Jerusalem, and is regarded as having the role of the priesthood: "In the holy tabernacle I ministered before him, and so I was established in Zion." (24:10) Compare this proclamation with what is found in the Book of Hebrews chapters 3-10 describing Christ as our "high priest" ministering at a heavenly tabernacle.