In Matthew 12 we read a prolonged series of exchanges between Christ and the scribes and Pharisees.  Beginning in verse 34 and continuing through the first half of verse 39 we find a condensing and paraphrase of Wisdom of Solomon 1:1-11.   This paraphrase is made by Christ himself.   Christ then connects their request for a sign to two things.   First Jonah and second to the Wisdom of Solomon, both by name.   What we find in the book Wisdom of Solomon, following the part that the Christ condensed and paraphrased is one of the strongest prophecies of Christ in the old testament.   He fulfilled both the prophecy in Wisdom of Solomon and the prefigurement of his resurrection in Jonah.

Matthew 12:34-39 presents four key ideas:

1. It speaks to the rulers of the day, the scribes and Pharisees, which Christ unafectionately refers to as “O generation of vipers”.
2. Good cannot come from evil, what comes out of the heart discloses the nature of the heart.
3. Those who are evil ask for a sign, a test.
4. In the day of judgement we will have to answer for every careless word, our words will either justify or condemn us.

Wisdom 1:1-11 repeats in a more lengthy form the same ideas.

1. The passage is directed to the “rulers of the earth”
2. Wisdom, that which is good, cannot enter a heart that is evil.
3. Wisdom is only found by those who do not put it to the test.  The foolish and the perverse are convicted when they put it to the test.
4. Our words are all heard by God, he will hold us accountable for what we say, and we will be judged by them.

The following chart will show the ideas reworded, restated and condensed by Christ next to passages from Wisdom of Solomon.  In the second row note that goodness, the holy spirit won’t enter a deceitful soul and flees from deceit and foolish thoughts.  This compares to the idea that unless the heart is good, then goodness cannot come from it.

Matthew 12	Wisdom 1
O generation of vipers ( Spoken to scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees which are the rulers in longer discourse to them )	you rulers of the earth
out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. [35]  A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.	because wisdom will not enter a deceitful soul, nor dwell in a body enslaved to sin. [5] For a holy and disciplined spirit will flee from deceit, and will rise and depart from foolish thoughts, and will be ashamed at the approach of unrighteousness.
That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.  [37]  For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.	[6] For wisdom is a kindly spirit and will not free a blasphemer from the guilt of his words; because God is witness of his inmost feelings, and a true observer of his heart, and a hearer of his tongue.  [7] Because the Spirit of the Lord has filled the world, and that which holds all things together knows what is said;  [8] therefore no one who utters unrighteous things will escape notice, and justice, when it punishes, will not pass him by. [9] For inquiry will be made into the counsels of an ungodly man, and a report of his words will come to the Lord, to convict him of his lawless deeds; [10] because a jealous ear hears all things, and the sound of murmurings does not go unheard. [11] Beware then of useless murmuring, and keep your tongue from slander; because no secret word is without result, and a lying mouth destroys the soul.
An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign;	seek him with sincerity of heart; [2] because he is found by those who do not put him to the test, and manifests himself to those who do not distrust him. [3] For perverse thoughts separate men from God, and when his power is tested, it convicts the foolish;

Continuing in Matthew 12:39-41 the Christ says there will be no sign but that of Jonah and the men of Nineveh will condemn the scribes and Pharisees in the judgement because they listened to Jonah.  Then in Matthew 12:42  the Christ adds that the Queen of the South will rise and condemn them as well because she listened to the Wisdom of Solomon.

But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nin’eveh will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. The queen of the South will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold, something greater than Solomon is here.

What was it that Solomon said, relative to the Christ ?  We find no prophecies of Christ in the writings of Solomon in the protestant canon of the old testament.   But at the same time the above example of paraphrase and condensing is not precisely compelling.   A question would be, did Christ really mean the book Wisdom of Solomon or something more abstract.   The answer to that question comes in what follows next after this paraphrase in Wisdom of Solomon and in how Matthew uses it.

The passages of Wisdom following this paraphrase directly attack the rulers, the covenant with the devil and death, due to their reasoning that their is no afterlife, no consequence for actions, and thus they oppressed people for gain.   This was the ideology of the Epicureans, the Sadducees, the philosophy of those who condemned the Christ, an innocent man, and it is the ideology of modern atheism in all its forms.  It follows here.

Do not invite death by the error of your life, nor bring on destruction by the works of your hands; because God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living. For he created all things that they might exist, and the generative forces of the world are wholesome, and there is no destructive poison in them; and the dominion of Hades is not on earth. For righteousness is immortal.

 

But ungodly men by their words and deeds summoned death; considering him a friend, they pined away, and they made a covenant with him, because they are fit to belong to his party.

 

For they reasoned unsoundly, saying to themselves, “Short and sorrowful is our life, and there is no remedy when a man comes to his end, and no one has been known to return from Hades. Because we were born by mere chance, and hereafter we shall be as though we had never been; because the breath in our nostrils is smoke, and reason is a spark kindled by the beating of our hearts. When it is extinguished, the body will turn to ashes, and the spirit will dissolve like empty air. Our name will be forgotten in time and no one will remember our works; our life will pass away like the traces of a cloud, and be scattered like mist that is chased by the rays of the sun and overcome by its heat. For our allotted time is the passing of a shadow, and there is no return from our death, because it is sealed up and no one turns back.

 

“Come, therefore, let us enjoy the good things that exist, and make use of the creation to the full as in youth. Let us take our fill of costly wine and perfumes, and let no flower of spring pass by us. Let us crown ourselves with rosebuds before they wither. Let none of us fail to share in our revelry, everywhere let us leave signs of enjoyment, because this is our portion, and this our lot. Let us oppress the righteous poor man; let us not spare the widow nor regard the gray hairs of the aged. But let our might be our law of right, for what is weak proves itself to be useless.

There are several NT gospel cases where the belief and practice of the above philosophy comes into conflict with Christ and his followers.   This sets the stage for the tension between the oppression and liberation of the people that is common in the gospels.

Next after this passage, in Wisdom 2, is the clear prophecy of the Christ, this is why Christ pointed them to this passage, this is what would be fulfilled and what they would face because they did not listen to it.  It is stunningly direct.

“Let us lie in wait for the righteous man, because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions; he reproaches us for sins against the law, and accuses us of sins against our training. He professes to have knowledge of God, and calls himself a child of the Lord. 

 

He became to us a reproof of our thoughts; the very sight of him is a burden to us, because his manner of life is unlike that of others, and his ways are strange. We are considered by him as something base, and he avoids our ways as unclean;
he calls the last end of the righteous happy, and boasts that God is his father.

 

Let us see if his words are true, and let us test what will happen at the end of his life; for if the righteous man is God’s son, he will help him, and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries. Let us test him with insult and torture, that we may find out how gentle he is, and make trial of his forbearance. Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for, according to what he says, he will be protected.”

 

Thus they reasoned, but they were led astray, for their wickedness blinded them, and they did not know the secret purposes of God, nor hope for the wages of holiness, nor discern the prize for blameless souls; for God created man for incorruption,
and made him in the image of his own eternity, but through the devil’s envy death entered the world, and those who belong to his party experience it.

 

Matthew records the fulfillment of these passages throughout his Gospel.    A very high number of the encounters with the rulers, secular or religious, in Matthew are examples directly related to this prophetic passage.   Likewise the other Gospels but I have not presently documented those.  I have attempted to demonstrate these connections at this link.

Beyond Christ and Matthew I rather quickly discovered Paul the Apostle was using Wisdom of Solomon too.  Paul opens Romans with a significant paraphrase of Wisdom of Solomon.

All of the attacks against the dueterocanonical works, and the use of them by the Church, are ultimately attack Christ and the authors of the New Testament. The Church rightly held that use of this book was part of the deposit of Faith it received from Christ and the apostles.  It is clear why Jewish people who accepted Jesus as the Christ would accept this book as inspired and why Jewish people who did not accept Jesus as the Christ would reject it.  It is disingenuous to say Judaism completely rejected the book Wisdom of Solomon given that Christ, Matthew and Paul, Jews themselves, were using it.