Texts in Conversation
Genesis tells how Lot’s wife looks back at Sodom and becomes a pillar of salt as a sign of disobedience. Wisdom of Solomon recalls this story within a retelling of Israel’s past, presenting the salt pillar as a lasting reminder of judgment.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Genesis 19:26
Hebrew Bible
24 Then the Lord rained down sulfur and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah. It was sent down from the sky by the Lord. 25 So he overthrew those cities and all that region, including all the inhabitants of the cities and the vegetation that grew from the ground. 26 But Lot’s wife looked back longingly and was turned into a pillar of salt. 27 Abraham got up early in the morning and went to the place where he had stood before the Lord. 28 He looked out toward Sodom and Gomorrah and all the land of that region. As he did so, he saw the smoke rising up from the land like smoke from a furnace.
Date: 750–400 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Wisdom of Solomon 10:7
Deuterocanon
5 Moreover, when nations consenting together in wickedness had been confounded, wisdom knew the righteous man, and preserved him blameless to God, and kept him strong when his heart yearned toward his child. 6 While the ungodly were perishing, wisdom delivered a righteous man, when he fled from the fire that descended out of heaven on the five cities. 7 To whose wickedness a smoking waste still witnesses, and plants bearing fair fruit that doesn’t ripen, a disbelieving soul has a memorial: a standing pillar of salt. 8 For having passed wisdom by, not only were they disabled from recognising the things which are good, but they also left behind them for their life a monument of their folly, so that where they stumbled, they might fail even to be unseen; 9 but wisdom delivered those who waited on her out of troubles.
Date: 50 BCE – 50 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Wisdom of Solomon has little interest in accurately recounting Old Testament history; such material is used solely for the author’s own apologetic ends. Hence Adam’s transgression in the Garden is glossed over (10:1; see also Sirach 49:16), and Cain is made the direct cause of the flood (10:4), passing over the difficult account of the fall of the angels (Genesis 6:1–4). Inevitably this moralizing and chauvinistic attitude to history leads the author into logically inconsistent statements. When Israel is persecuted her oppressors become the ungodly (10:15 and 10:20), but when Israel does the same to the Canaanites the author has to wriggle and squirm with embarrassment, coming up with nonsense like 12:10–11. For 10:1–2 see Genesis 2:7–4:16, for 10:4, Genesis 6–9, for 10:5, Genesis 10–22, for 10:6–8, Genesis 19, for 10:9–12, Genesis 27–33, for 10:13–14, Genesis 37–47, and for 10:15–21 Exodus 1–15. The chapter is held together, and its units marked out, by the repeated use of the pronoun hautē (translated “wisdom” in the NRSV) in verses 1, 5, 6, 10, 13, and 15. Each unit contains the word dikaios (righteous) once ..."
A. Peter Hayman, Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible: Wisdom of Solomon (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 2019), 56.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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