With Him all things were created: Mary, throne of the trinitarian wisdom

“I was delighted with all things in him, and found pleasure in his company every day. I played before him at all times.” (Proverbs 8:30)With Him I Was: The First Reading for the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity (Year C) presents one of the most astonishing texts from the Old Testament: the figure of Wisdom speaking in the first person and describing her presence with God before creation. «When he prepared the heavens, I was there… I was with him as a craftsman, and I was his delight each day, playing before him at all times» (Pr 8:27-30). Christian tradition has read this text as a prefiguration of the Eternal Word, the divine Wisdom identified in the Gospel of John’s Prologue as the Logos. Mariology finds in this text the deepest foundation for the title «Seat of Wisdom»: Mary, who gave birth to the incarnate Wisdom, is the «place» where the trinitarian life entered history.

I. With Him I Was: Wisdom of Pr 8 and Trinitarian Theology

Pr 8:22-31, in the reading «With Him I Was», presents Wisdom (in Hebrew *Hokmah*, in Greek *Sophia*) as a figure who preexists creation, who was «with God» before anything existed, and who actively participated in the work of creation. This figure has been interpreted in various ways throughout history: as a personified divine attribute (Jewish tradition), as the Eternal Word of the Father (Christian interpretation from the 2nd century onwards), and as the Holy Spirit (some patristic readings).The dominant Christian tradition, from Origen and Athanasius, identified the «Wisdom» of Pr 8 with the Logos of Jn 1:1: the Eternal Son who «was with God and was God» before creation. The verse Pr 8:22, «The Lord established me in the beginning of his ways, before his works», was the central text of the Arian controversy: Arians read «established me» (*ektisen*) as «created me», concluding that the Son was a creature. The Nicene responded that the Hebrew verb *qanah* means «possess» or «generate», not «create», and that Wisdom is not a creature but the Eternal Son generated by the Father «before all centuries».The resolution of the Arian debate (Nicea in 325) did not diminish interest in Pr 8; it deepened it. The Wisdom who «played before God» before creation, «delighting in the sons of men» (Pr 8:31), is the Eternal Son in his pre-cosmic joy with the Father. This joy, «delighting in each day», is one of the most beautiful images of intratrinitarian life: not the distant, immobile Absolute, but the lively and «playful» joy of a Son with his Father.The relationship between Pr 8 and the Trinity has an important pneumatological dimension. While some Fathers identified Wisdom with the Word, others (in particular Theophilus of Antioch and Irenaeus) identified it with the Holy Spirit.Modern theology, particularly the “Sophia-theology” of Sergei Bulgakov, proposes a more nuanced reading: Wisdom in Proverbs 8 is a figure that simultaneously points to the Son (as the reason for creation) and to the Spirit (as the love of creation). This pneumatological reading of Wisdom has direct mariological implications.II. Cum eo eram: Mary as the Throne of WisdomCum eo eram: the title “Throne of Wisdom” (Sedes Sapientiae) in the Loreto Litany is one of the richest expressions in the Marian tradition. The “throne” is not merely the external support of the King seated, but the place that manifests His presence and dignity. Mary, as “Throne of Wisdom,” is, in a primary sense, the one in whose womb Eternal Wisdom “sat” (or dwelt), becoming concretely, historically, and corporally present. The “cum eo eram” (with Him was) of Wisdom becomes, in Mary, a historical presence.The application of Proverbs 8 to Mary has roots in patristic thought. Bernard of Clairvaux, who developed Marian theology with a poetic intensity unparalleled in medieval Western Christianity, meditated at length on Mary as “Throne of Wisdom” and as a “temple” where Wisdom dwelt. The Wisdom that “played before God” before creation “played” afterward in the cradle of Bethlehem, and the cradle of Bethlehem was Mary’s arms.Iconography of the “Throne of Wisdom,” one of the oldest Marian iconographic types, present since the 4th century, depicts Mary seated, frontal, and hieratic, with the Son seated on her lap as on a throne. This image, brought to the West by the Crusaders and influencing Roman sculpture (notably the famous black Madonnas of Auvergne), visually expresses the theology of the title: Mary is not a passive container, but the active throne of Wisdom, the place that gave Wisdom its visible and historical form.The contemplative dimension of this title has been explored by feminist theological tradition: Juliana of Norwich, Hildegard of Bingen, Gertrude of Helfta, all found in Mary “Throne of Wisdom” the model of a contemplative soul that becomes “seat” of divine Wisdom. Not only was Mary the “throne” of Wisdom, but every soul that receives Christ through faith and the sacraments becomes, in a certain way, “seat” of divine Wisdom. Mary is the most perfect model of this reception, but she also invites all to become “thrones” where Wisdom dwells.III. Cum eo eram: The Trinitarian Joy and Mary’s JoyCum eo eram: Proverbs 8:30-31 proclaims: “I was his delight each day, playing before him all the time, playing in the son of man’s world, and my delight was with the children of men.”

The image of Wisdom “playing” (sahaq in Hebrew, to play, dance, laugh) “before God” is one of the most striking images in Scripture: the intratrinitarian life has a dimension of joyful play, of “game” (Spiel) that Proverbs 8 expresses with rare poetic audacity.

Hans Urs von Balthasar developed this image of the “Wisdom playing” in dialogue with Patristic tradition: the “eternal play” of the Son in the bosom of the Father is the expression of the freedom and joy of trinitarian life. Creation is not a necessity but “play“, the free expression of a joy that overflows. And the Incarnation, the Wisdom now “playing” in the “habitable world” and “delighting in the children of men“, is the extension of this “play” to time and history.

Mary participates in this trinitarian joy in a unique way. The Magnificat (Luke 1:46: “My spirit rejoices in God my Savior“) is the expression of the creature who received the Wisdom playing and who was infected by its joy. This Marian joy is not superficial; it is the deep joy of one in contact with the source of all joy: the intratrinitarian love that Proverbs 8 describes as eternal “delight“.

The feast of the Most Holy Trinity, which Ordinary Time inaugurates, invites us to contemplate this trinitarian joy as the horizon of Christian life. One does not follow God out of fear, but because the life of God is pure joy, “eternal play“, “delight“. Mary, who stood close to this joy, who lived with the incarnate Wisdom for decades, is the best guide to this contemplation: she who “kept all these things in her heart” (Luke 2:19, 51) knew that what was happening to her was, fundamentally, the extension of “eternal play” of Wisdom to the time of human history.

IV. Cum eo eram: the Spirit, Wisdom, and Mary, Pentecost continues in the Trinity

Cum eo eram: The Feast of the Most Holy Trinity follows Pentecost immediately, not by chance. The Spirit who descended at Pentecost is the Spirit of the Trinity: the gift of Pentecost is the experiential revelation that God is Father, Son, and Spirit, and that this trinitarian life has been communicated to us. The “Wisdom” of Proverbs 8, who “was with God” before creation, is the Wisdom that the Pentecost Spirit communicates to the faithful: the interior intelligence of God’s mysteries, which is the fruit of trinitarian love. The “cum eo eram” of Proverbs 8 is fulfilled in the Spirit who brings us close to trinitarian life.

Mary, who received the Spirit in the Annunciation and was present at the Pentecost in the Upper Room, is the creature who most fully received the gift of “trinitarian Wisdom“. Not academic or philosophical wisdom, but the wisdom of love that the Spirit communicates, which allows “to know” God not from outside but from within, as one who dwells and transforms. This wisdom that Mary received in fullness is what the Litany invokes in the title “Sedes Sapientiae“: not merely the “physical seat” where Wisdom rested, but the “spiritual throne” of a creature fully inhabited by trinitarian life.

The Feast of the Trinity, closing the cycle that began with Advent and passed through Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, now opens the long Ordinary Time: the time when trinitarian life is called to penetrate everyday life. Mary, who lived the “ordinary time” of Nazareth with the fullness of trinitarian Wisdom that inhabited her, is the model of this “trinitarian everyday“: ordinary life transformed from within by the presence of the Father, Son, and Spirit, which Proverbs 8 anticipated and Pentecost made effective.

Mary, the “Throne of Wisdom” who in time generated the Eternal Wisdom that “played before the Father,” is the most eloquent icon of the Trinitarian life that flows over creation, and the Common Time is called to live this out in daily life.

References

• Second Vatican Council, Lumen Gentium, nos. 53-65 (1964).
• H. U. von Balthasar, Theologik, II: «Wahrheit Gottes» (1985).
• Bernard of Clairvaux, Homilies on “Missus est,” IV.
• R. Brown, The Gospel According to John, vol. I (1966).
• A. Serra, Sapienza e Contemplazione di Maria (1990).