"Sophia, Sophia, Sophia"

Wisdom is a Woman and her name is Sophia!

One of my favorite books in the whole wide world is Alice Walker's The Color Purple.  In the book there is an amazingly large character in life, size, personality, tenacity and strength.  The character's name is Sophia, played by the incomparable Oprah Winfrey in Steven Spielburg's film adaptation by the same title.  We are first introduced to this "generous recipe of a woman," as the love interest of Harpo.  Admittedly I'm making some assumptions here about your familiarity with this book, so if you are not familiar with the book or the movie, here's a tip - stop what you're doing and go get it!  Don't walk, but run, run as fast as you can and go get it!  Okay, where was I?  Oh yeah, "Sophia, Sophia, Sophia!"  No doubt you are asking yourself, where is she going with this?  Well, be patient and you'll see soon enough.  Sometimes, the journey to a given destination is the best part, so hold on to your tail feathers. It may not have anything to do with it - and then again, maybe it does.

As you know, we have been dealing with Marcus Borg's book, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time.  We just finished chapter 5, which is entitled, "Jesus, the Wisdom of God; Sophia becomes flesh."  Ahhh, if you know anything about me, and maybe most of you don't, but a few of you do, you know that I was scratching like a dog with a bad case of fleas to get to this chapter.  Along with chapter 5, I asked the class to read Proverbs 1:20-9.  It would be irresponsible of me to simply go over the chapter without at least including Proverbs.  For without it traveling along with us on this journey to meet Jesus again for the first time, we would not be able to "eat of [her] bread and drink of the wine [she] has mixed" for our journey (Proverbs 9:5).  We might get to our final destination, but it won't be as fulfilling, nor as fun if we leave it behind.  I also suggest you read the Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach.  Okay, are you ready?  Get set...  Let's go.

In both Hebrew and Greek, "wisdom" is a feminine noun.  In Hebrew it is Hokmah.  In Greek, it is Sophia and because in English, Sophia is a female name, whenever "wisdom" is personified as a woman or having female characteristics in the text - even if the text is in Hebrew - scholars commonly use the name Sophia.  Thereby remaining ever mindful of its feminine personification.  And so, when we read in Proverbs, "wisdom" saying to us; "The Lord created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago.  Ages ago I was set up at the first, before the beginning of the earth.  When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no springs abounding with water.  Before the mountains had been shaped, before the hills, I was brought forth - when he had not yet made earth an fields, or the world's first bits of soil.  When he established the heavens, I was there... I was beside him, like a master worker; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race," we must hear it in the feminine form (Proverbs 9:22-27a, 30a,31).

Along with that, we hear her echoed voice in the book of John, where a similar declaration is made; "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.  What has come into being in him is life, and the life was the light of all people.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it" (John 1:1-5).  Now, before you men go getting all wound up and excited, traditionally, a common mistake is made here.  Jesus, is consciously and unconsciously, read into the text where the word "Word" is.  "Word," in Greek is logos, which is a masculine noun.  It is a leap, and a good try, but it doesn't signify Jesus, nor does it translate into the masculine.  Why?  Because in this context, logos is referencing the Hebrew connotation of "wisdom," which is and remains feminine - Sophia.  So no, Jesus was not in the beginning with God, the logos was.  And what is logos?  Scholars call it the "functional equivalent" of Sophia.  We must then read that passage thus, "In the beginning was Sophia, and Sophia was God.  She was in the beginning with God.  All things came into being through her, and without her not one thing came into being...."  Whew!  Now that was a lot! 

   

Both of the referenced passages point to attributes of God - all powerful, all knowing, "the fashioner of all things," "the mother of all good things." And again, emphasizing the "functional equivalency" of words, not only was Sophia with God, but indeed, Sophia is the female image of God.  Whoa Lawd!  Hold on, hold on, don't go getting your panties in a wad.  I'm just saying!  Step out of your traditional comfort zone of conventional wisdom and into the new alternative wisdom introduced to us by Jesus the Nazarene.  Okay, okay, I'm gonna wrap this up, because it really is too deep and too much to try to cover in one post, but suffice it to say, in the synoptic gospels, that is Matthew, Mark and Luke, a correlation is drawn between Jesus and Sophia.  Jesus speaks of both himself and John the Baptizer as children of Sophia, "For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say,'He has a demon'; the Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!'  Nevertheless, [Sophia] is vindicated by all her children" (Luke 7:33-35).  Why did I insert Sophia in that text?  Remember, whenever "wisdom" is used in the female form, i.e. traits characteristically associated with a woman, Sophia is used.

I'll end this post with the gospel of John where we reach that climatic moment when... drum roll please - "And [Sophia] became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen [her] glory..." (John 1:14a).  Yes,  "Jesus is the incarnation of divine [wisdom], Sophia becomes flesh."  Umph, umph, umph, "Miss Celie!  I's feels like sanging!"   

"Sophia, Sophia, Sophia!  Ooooo wee!  Dat sho' is a purty name!"

© Dorinda G. Henry, 2010

THEOLOGIA HABITUS EST!