Texts in Conversation
Wisdom of Solomon describes the righteous, after death, shining like stars and ruling over the nations, linking their vindication with restored dignity. This draws on Psalm 8, where humans are crowned with honor and set to rule over creation.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Psalm 8:5
Hebrew Bible
3 When I look up at the heavens, which your fingers made, and see the moon and the stars, which you set in place, 4 Of what importance is the human race, that you should notice them? Of what importance is mankind, that you should pay attention to them? 5 You made them a little less than the heavenly beings. You crowned mankind with honor and majesty. 6 you appoint them to rule over your creation; you have placed everything under their authority, 7 including all the sheep and cattle, as well as the wild animals, 8 the birds in the sky, the fish in the sea, and everything that moves through the currents of the seas.
Date: 600–201 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Wisdom of Solomon 5:15
Deuterocanon
14 Because the hope of the ungodly man is like chaff carried by the wind, and as thin frost driven away by a tempest; and is scattered like smoke by the wind, and passes by as the remembrance of a guest who stays just a day. 15 But the righteous live forever. Their reward is in the Lord, and the care for them with the Most High. 16 Therefore they will receive the crown of royal dignity and the diadem of beauty from the Lord’s hand, because he will cover them with his right hand, and he will shield them with his arm. 17 He will take his zeal as complete armor, and will make the whole creation his weapons to punish his enemies:
Date: 50 BCE – 50 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Not only will the righteous shine forth (the Dan. 12 allusion), but also this metaphor is mined to include both light and heat, as the righteous burn up the stubble of wickedness. And besides executing judgment, the righteous ones (now immortal) will exercise dominion over the nations—precisely the reversal envisioned in Daniel 7 and other Second Temple texts. Two chapters later the resurrection of God’s elect is linked even more explicitly to their royal status ... What we have here is the restoration of the faithful to their rightful human status, with echoes of Psalm 8 (crowned with glory and honor). The eschaton will bring to fruition God’s original intent at creation. This interpretation is congruent with the emphasis in the Wisdom of Solomon on the goodness of creation ..."
J. Richard Middleton, A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical Eschatology (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014), 144.
* 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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