Font Size
Wisdom 11:15-17
New Catholic Bible
Wisdom 11:15-17
New Catholic Bible
God’s Kindness toward the Peoples[a]
A Dose of Chastisement for Egypt[b]
15 In return for the foolish reasonings of their wickedness,
which misled them into worshiping serpents bereft of reason and insects devoid of worth,
you sent as punishment upon them hordes of irrational creatures,[c]
16 so that they might learn that the agents of one’s sin are the instruments of one’s punishment.[d]
17 For your all-powerful hand,
which created the world out of formless matter,[e]
had the wherewithal to send upon them a host of bears or savage lions,
Footnotes
- Wisdom 11:15 In its history, each people amasses accounts of its glorious deeds and victories over enemies. In doing this, Israel also wanted to proclaim the greatness of God and to assure its own destiny. The idea was a just and remarkable one, but its expression was rather barbaric. In time, the people could no longer be content with very rudimentary accounts in the wake of their refined consciences, their experience of setbacks, and their encounter with other cultures that had their own past. Nonetheless, faith in God’s grandeur remained with them and increased.
- Wisdom 11:15 In this collection of the past, the author is concerned with forewarning his compatriots against the allure of the cults of animals, which were flourishing in Alexandria at that time.
- Wisdom 11:15 Hordes of irrational creatures: i.e., frogs (Ex 8:1-2), gnats (Ex 8:13-14), flies (Ex 8:20), and locusts (Ex 10:12-15).
- Wisdom 11:16 This adage expresses one of the rules of the divine pedagogy, which makes use of the fault to bring about repentance (see Ps 7:15-17). This “law of talion” (or “tit for tat”) is found in Ex 21:23ff; Lev 24:18ff; Deut 19:21; 2 Mac 4:38; 5:10; 13:8; 15:32ff; Mt 5:38ff; 7:2.
- Wisdom 11:17 Formless matter: the author uses this concept derived from Greek philosophy (see note on v. 15) to describe the chaos of Gen 1:2.
