Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi

The Cultural Life Setting of the Proverbs

Biblical Studies & Commentaries

“The biblical Proverbs truly is the book of works and days of human existence. It is as though an ideal film camera were placed in the middle of a piazza, inside a modest dwelling place, or in a noble palace: before it would pass by all the splendours and miseries of humanity, the arts and the professions, the seasons and the social occasions, the pleasures and suffering, and even the songs and deepest reflections. It is, then, not only legitimate but also necessary that a biblical scholar of such great exegetical and cultural finesse as John J. Pilch should choose to apply to this biblical book an analysis from a social-science angle, so as to gather the multiple aspects of the constant Comédie humaine, recorded by Hebrew wisdom. On the stage, in fact, is human life without time and without spatial coordinates, a scene repeated today in our cities and villages. Once again we have proof that the biblical religion is historical and incarnate and not abstract and mythical.”