Sophia Christology

Our examination begins with the following key texts:

Proverbs 1:20-3:20; 8:22-9:13; Wisdomof Solomon 7:24-9:2; Ben Sirah 1:1-20; 4:12-13; 24:3; 24:8-10; 24:21-22

1 Cor 1-2; Phil 2:6-11; Col 1:15-20; Mark 6:2; Matt 11:16-30; 23:37-39; Heb 1:1-3

In the Gospel of John, the female sophia becomes the male logos. John 1:1-19; 7: 28-29; 8:23-24; 12:44-48; 5:19-22; 10:37-38;

Martin Hengel argues that the concept of sophia "was always threatened by mythological speculation" and so the word logos was used. Logos was "safer" because it was a masculine term.

Martin Scott thinks that it was simply that Jesus, as the incarnation of God, had to be gender specific and the clash of the female pronoun for sophia called for the substitution of a male noun, logos.

In the scriptural tradition Sophia is a hypostasis or personification of a divine attribute acting as a separate entity but ultimately identical with God. She is comparable to the Shekinah and Memra of God or to the poetic personification of Jerusalem as Zion.

In feminist literature and theology Sophia has taken on great significance in the last two decades.

November 1993 Minneapolis Reimagining God, Community and Church.

In some cases, the Sophia tradition has been appropriated in liturgy in order to provide positive female images and theological language. In other cases, Sophia emerges as a sort of Trinitarian theology (cf. Elizabeth Johnson, She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse.). Church authorities critical of the use of the Sophia tradition have called it the worship of a goddess. (Council of Bishops of the United Methodist Church, 1995:30)