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Context No. 112 of 4322 · Wisdom

Context · Reflection

Wisdom 12:1-16: in context

1For your incorruptible spirit is in all things. 2Therefore you convict little by little those who fall from the right way, and, putting them in remembrance by the things wherein they sin, you admonish them, that escaping from their wickedness they may believe in you, O Lord. 3For truly the old inhabitants of your holy land, 4hating them because they practiced detestable works of enchantments and unholy rites— 5merciless slaughters of children and sacrificial banquets of men’s flesh and of blood— 6allies in an impious fellowship, and murderers of their own helpless babes, it was your counsel to destroy by the hands of our fathers; 7that the land which in your sight is most precious of all might receive a worthy colony of God’s servants. 8Nevertheless you even spared these as men, and you sent hornets as forerunners of your army, to cause them to perish little by little. 9Not that you were unable to subdue the ungodly under the hand of the righteous in battle, or by terrible beasts or by a stern word to make away with them at once, 10but judging them little by little you gave them a chance to repent, not being ignorant that their nature by birth was evil, their wickedness inborn, and that their manner of thought would never be changed. 11For they were a cursed seed from the beginning. It wasn’t through fear of any that you left them unpunished for their sins. 12For who will say, “What have you done?” Or “Who will withstand your judgment?” Who will accuse you for the perishing of nations which you caused? Or who will come and stand before you as an avenger for unrighteous men? 13For there isn’t any God beside you that cares for all, that you might show that you didn’t judge unrighteously. 14No king or prince will be able to confront you about those whom you have punished. 15But being righteous, you rule all things righteously, deeming it a thing alien from your power to condemn one who doesn’t deserve to be punished. 16For your strength is the source of righteousness, and your sovereignty over all makes you to forbear all.

The Wisdom of Solomon was written in Greek by a Jew in Alexandria, and its later chapters reread Israel's history. This passage takes up the hardest question in that history: the destruction of the Canaanites. The writer does not deny it. He explains what he thinks God was doing, and the explanation is unusual.

God's imperishable spirit is in all things, he begins, and so God corrects offenders little by little, reminding them of the very things they sin in, so that they may turn and believe. Applied to Canaan, that means the conquest was not sudden. God gave them time and space to change. The writer lists what he thinks they were doing, killing children in ritual and holding cultic meals, and he says God still sent hornets ahead of the army rather than wiping them out at once, precisely to leave room for repentance.

Then the sentence that carries it: you are sovereign in strength, and you judge with mildness, and you govern us with great forbearance, for power is yours whenever you wish. He argues that restraint is what strength looks like when it has nothing to prove, and that God's own patience is the model Israel is supposed to learn from. What do I do with power when nothing would stop me from using all of it?

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