Who Is Sophia?

A name for wisdom

Sophia is the Greek word for wisdom. In the Hebrew scriptures and the wisdom writings that followed, Wisdom appears as a woman. She calls, she teaches, she builds, and she was present at the making of the world. Jewish, Christian and later mystical traditions have each understood her in their own way, and those differences matter.

She calls at the gates

In the Book of Proverbs, Wisdom does not hide. She stands on the heights, at the crossroads and beside the city gates, the places where people meet and decisions are made, and she raises her voice: “Doth not wisdom cry? and understanding put forth her voice?” (Proverbs 8:1).

She says she was beside the Creator at the beginning, before the mountains were shaped, rejoicing before him. And “Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars” (Proverbs 9:1).

Breath of the power of God

The Wisdom of Solomon, kept in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, calls her “the breath of the power of God” and “the brightness of the everlasting light” (Wisdom 7:25–26). Here she is more than a teacher. She is radiance itself.

Holy Wisdom

The great church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople was dedicated to Holy Wisdom, understood in Orthodox teaching as Christ, the Wisdom of God. Icons of Sophia take several forms; one Kievan icon shows the Mother of God beneath an arch of seven pillars, drawing on Proverbs 9.

Christian traditions do not worship Sophia as a goddess, and later mystical and Gnostic writings told her story differently again. In the She Is circle, Sophia stands as Wisdom herself, present and speaking, in the woman’s form these texts gave her.

Wisdom and voice

Wisdom in Proverbs is not quiet knowing kept to oneself. She speaks in public, where it counts. For women whose voices have been talked over, this is a striking image: in these books, the teacher of wisdom is a woman, raising her voice at the gate.