The Tree of Life: An Exploration of Biblical Wisdom Literature

Since 1990 Roland Murphy's Tree of Life has been a standard introduction to the wisdom literature of the Bible. Now The Tree of Life is available in a third edition, complete with a new preface by the author and a special supplement that surveys the latest developments in wisdom research.

This superb study thoroughly explores the wisdom writings of the Bible, interpreting this literature in a way that illumines the development of Israel's search for wisdom throughout its tumultuous history. Murphy looks at each wisdom book individually — Proverbs, Job, Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiasticus, and Wisdom of Solomon — and adds to them a discussion of wisdom from other parts of the Old Testament. His careful investigations expose the various guises that wisdom adopts — the "fear of the Lord," moral formation, the universality of human experience, the mysteries of creation, and others.