Sunday’s First Reading was Solomon’s prayer for wisdom and God’s generous response, pleased at what the young king had asked for. Wisdom in the Biblical tradition is not about knowledge or erudition; Solomon was not asking to be an Einstein. Wisdom is about how to live rightly, which in Israel’s terms meant above all how to live right vis-à-vis God. A wise man may be educationally illiterate; a highly credentialed scholar may be a fool (the Biblical opposite of being wise). God is first pleased with the fact that Solomon wants to be wise, i.e., he wants to live rightly with others, above all, with God. That’s everyman’s vocation.

But God is also pleased that Solomon asks for a gift that will serve others. Solomon isn’t asking for personal perks: a longer life or wealth. He isn’t motivated by revenge: conquest of his enemies. What he wants is intended to put him on right terms with others. And, because he is aware of who he is — the king, and particularly the successor of great David — he recognizes his vocation is to do justice in Israel.

Solomon prays for “an understanding heart to judge your people and to distinguish right from wrong. For who is able to govern this vast people of yours?” Note there is no “who am I to judge” here. Solomon recognizes that his mission is to govern “this… people” — and that means judging right from wrong.

That line in Solomon’s prayer also strikes me because it seems to contrast with Genesis. Solomon wants to “distinguish right from wrong.” Satan tempts Eve with envy that God wanted to keep her and Adam from “knowing right and wrong.” Has God changed His mind?

No. In Genesis 3:1-7, Adam and Eve imagine that God defines good and evil by capricious fiat, so they aspire to “know” good and evil. In the Bible, to “know” is not theoretical; it is practical and experiential. It’s why to “know” one’s wife was a euphemism for sexual intercourse. What our first parents want is the false idea that they can “know” (i.e., experience) good and evil. But to experience evil is to be part of it, i.e., to sin. God does not sin. Man, then, cannot sin and be on right terms with God.

Solomon is not asking to “know” good and evil in the sense of defining them. He accepts that God has established good and evil. He wants to know, and do, what God wants, not to exercise his arbitrary will. Indeed, the word the sacred writer uses to describe what Solomon asks for is  לְהָבִ֖ין, to “discern.” Discerning is to recognize what something is, not to define (or redefine) that reality.

What Adam and Eve aspired to was a false image of God, i.e., a deity who makes things good or evil by mere decree, a false power they claimed. What Solomon asks for is to see things as God sees them, i.e., to “judge” according to truth. Those two things are worlds apart.

A reflection of that is found in the Responsorial Psalm: “Lord, I love your commands.” Reread that response again, focusing on the verb. The Psalmist does not sing, “Lord, I obey your commands.” No, he “loves” them — and love normally presupposes understanding. The Psalmist is aware that the commands of the Lord are not arbitrary. They make sense. They reflect the truth of God… who is Truth (Jn 14:6) and Love (1 Jn 4:8).