VIRTUOUS LIVING - Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University

created “free and responsible” (Gen. 1; Cox 1982:77; Goldingay 1994:50-51). Thisperception was a descent from the contemporary theological one which focused onGod’s redemptive activities from the Yahwistic tradition (10 th Century BC (Gen 2:28-30; Cox 1982:77; Goldingay 1994:50-51). It is this shift that led to an emphasis of thesecular and one which was welcomed by the sages as a sign of maturity, “a call to livein the world rather than against it. Life was presented, to a great degree, as a humanenterprise” (Cox 1982:77).Wisdom books present this secular dimension to some extent, as the sages establisheda socio-cultural society with its human-based governance (Prov. 16:10-15). The socialscene is dominated by human-made values, and the wise ruler is expressed in humanterms with acknowledgement of his share in the divine domain. This secular periodcan be traced from the reign of Saul until the exilic period (11 th - 6 th Century BC)progressively expressing the new pluralistic world of which Israel was part.In Saul’s time, there would have been recourse to ritual and inquiry from the divine.But in the world conceived by the sages (6 th century BC), a ruler, a teacher, or agovernment official had to be able to act on his own, as did the scribes of an earlierage in Egypt; he would not wait for a new revelation or a new divine intervention.There “grew an awareness that God tended to leave much of the day-to-day affairs toresponsible agents” as Cox elaborates that God the maker had given humanity themind for thinking and filled them with knowledge and understanding, even the abilityto distinguish good from evil. With these endowments it was a human’s vocation togo and exercise dominion. Cox observes that Wisdom literature reveals a changedperspective with a new insight, which offered to the individual a theological freedomdescribed by Cox thus:Wisdom saw the human being as one who is emancipated; one who wouldhave to make his own decisions and was free to do so – and of course thishuman being,- was one who would have to live with the consequences. Theliterature that found something of its inspiration in this idea clearlyrecognised human power, and also human limitations. But over and above allthere grew up a trust in the man’s capacity to cope – and of his own ability,not just by occasional grace (Cox 1982:78).The human vocation was to go out with these endowments and master the world.However, wisdom asks the practical question, “How does humanity master the250