Wisdom of Solomon 3:1–9

The death of Billy Graham got us talking about the content of the gospel in the United States. Many commentators hailed him as the greatest evangelist of our time and added up the millions of people who had been positively affected by his message. He faced his own death with a courage and serenity that caught the public imagination. He further testified that he anticipated that moment with no fear, but great anticipation of the life with Christ that awaited him on the other side.

There were times in Billy Graham’s sermons (if not his newspaper columns) when he seemed far more interested in what happens after we die than before. While few questioned the integrity of his life (with regard to use and/or abuse of money, fame, and power), some wondered whether he might have done more in his life to better the earthly journey of others (especially the excluded and/or overlooked). In this sense, then, the author of the Wisdom of Solomon might serve as the mirror opposite of more recent evangelists. What often happens before we die forced this author to think quite concretely about what might or might not happen after we die.

While scholars argue about the extent of persecution at the time this book was written (around the turn of the era in the cultural center of Alexandria), the overall trend of the narrative is clear. The Jews of this period lived their lives as a people under occupation and in diaspora, with the threat of exclusion and/or persecution a real possibility. Economic and political corruption were part of the landscape of this period. The untimely death of “the righteous,” from the period of the Maccabees forward, became a matter of not only theological conversation but existential endurance. If God is just, how can God’s people explain the deaths of God’s people, not despite but because of their faith? Both apocalyptic and eschatological ideas were on the rise, and the Wisdom of Solomon serves as a window into this particular stage of the journey (as do the New Testament debates of the Pharisees and Sadducees a little later; see Acts 23:6–8). It is also important to note that the author of the Wisdom of Solomon was an Alexandrian Jew heavily influenced by neo-Platonic ideas about the immortality of the soul, especially among the righteous.

However, here the preacher and teacher must be careful, because this immortality is indisputably not for everyone, but only for the righteous: “But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them” (v. 1). A brief examination of three terms within this passage might help the preacher begin to think about possible connections between our lives before death and our hopes for “immortality” on the other side.

The elect. Reformed Christians cannot help but see the term eklektos (v. 9) as “elect” in English translation and head off to the races. We trundle out an entire systematic theology of election and predestination, grounded in justification by faith, through no merit of our own, and all according to God’s grace. But, we would be wise to slow down. The word eklektos is not a foundational theological term in Wisdom of Solomon; it appears in only two other places in the book (3:14; 4:19). In addition, eklektos seems to be interchangeable with the word hagios (“holy”); note that the terms are reversed in 4:19. Most important, we must locate this term within its more immediate context, where “election” still points primarily to God’s communal election of God’s people Israel.

God’s holy ones. Hagios (“holy”) is a favorite word in the Wisdom of Solomon. In some places, hagios designates those people or things chosen and/or set apart by God: holy name (10:20), holy mountain (9:8), and holy people (10:15). But this last usage pairs “holy” with “blameless”: “holy people” and “blameless race” (10:15). Other verses blur any line between “holy” as chosen and “holy” as obedient: “For they will be made holy who observe holy things in holiness” (6:10). Throughout the book, there is a tension between “holiness” due to God’s election and “holiness” based on covenantal obedience in response to that election.

The righteous. The word dikaiosynē is deployed even more frequently in the Wisdom of Solomon, both as an adjective (“righteous”) and a noun (“righteousness”). It is firmly grounded in obedient and faithful actions, from the first verse onwards: “Love righteousness, you rulers of the earth” (1:1) and is the term most explicitly linked with the notion of immortality throughout the book: “For righteousness is immortal” (1:15). It is the righteous who are “in the hand of God” (3:1). It is the righteous who have died who “will condemn the ungodly who are living” (4: 16). It is the righteous who will live forever because “the Most High takes care of them” (5:15). The linkage then between loyal behavior before one dies and eternal protection and care after one dies seems essential to the thought world of this book in the Bible.

And so, for the preacher, the following guidelines might be in order. It is understandable that these verses are often used in services in witness to the resurrection. It is also predictable that these verses show up in the lectionary for use on All Saints Day. However, the preacher must recognize the inherent tension in these verses between any claim for eternal life grounded solely in God’s initiative regarding choosing, and a hope derived from covenantal obedience and/or loyalty in response. The testing and refining of this passage is not a general trial that comes to all mortals, but a testing and refining that grows out of loyalty to God and obedience to God’s ways. Many would say this is a better understanding of God’s grace in general, but it is not one that shows up all that frequently in All Saints’ observances.

It may well be the case that these less familiar verses help us to hear afresh more familiar verses that we have smoothed over theologically. Many would argue that any hope (past, present, or future) that has become unattached to ongoing demonstration of loyalty to God’s covenant with God’s people is unbiblical. The constant movement between a “holiness” derived from God’s choosing and a “holiness” grounded in covenantal “righteousness” is a pattern that readers of Scripture should know all too well. The language about righteousness and immortality in Wisdom of Solomon reminds us that some of the sacred texts of our tradition emphasize the importance of “works,” or proper conduct with each other, as a prerequisite for reward from God (cf. the New Testament letter of James).

When and whether to move toward a hope in immortality grounded in something or someone other than one’s own righteousness is a shift only the preacher knows when to make. Two moves seem off the table: either to abandon any correlation between what happens before and after death, or to make individual righteousness the sole criterion. Much better is it to point toward the righteousness embodied in the life and witness of Jesus Christ, whose Spirit now empowers us to follow where he leads. Many Christians see the life of Christ in Wis 3:1–9: “In the eyes of the foolish,” he seemed to have died (v. 2). Though he was punished “in the sight of others,” his “hope is full of immortality” (v. 4), and “having been disciplined a little,” he will receive great good (v. 5).

It is instructive here to lift up a confession of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) called “A Brief Statement of Faith.” First, the particular life of this “righteous” person is rehearsed: “preaching good news to the poor,” “teaching by word and deed,” “eating with the outcast.” Then his sacrificial death is remembered: “unjustly condemned for blasphemy and sedition, Jesus was crucified.” Finally, the resurrection of this righteous one is celebrated in a quite particular way: “God raised this Jesus from the dead.” This Jesus. This righteous one. What he did before he died changes what happens to us after we die. Indeed, his death and resurrection should change what happens before we die, “as the faithful abide with him in love (v. 9).” ¹