When thinking of Eve as Wisdom, we obviously can’t base this on the fact that she sinned. Some elements of her role in the Fall may be worth looking at, but I think I should save that for later.
The reason Eve might be seen as a prototype for Lady Wisdom in Proverbs is the way she is mentioned after our first parents are driven from the Garden. Only her reactions to subsequent events are mentioned, not Adam’s. When their first child is born, we get Eve’s response, not Adam’s.
Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.”
Genesis 4:1 ESV
And then later, she responds to the birth of another son.
And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.”
Genesis 4:25 ESV
Eve’s recorded reflections fit the message God spoke to the Serpent when He confronted the three of them about their disobedience. Eve is looking for a son to win a victory over her and his Enemy.
“I will put enmity between you and the woman,
Genesis 3:15
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.”
Her reflections also fit a regular feature of mothers in Genesis:
- Sarah worrying that Isaac’s inheritance is threatened if Hagar and Ishmael stay with Abraham.
- Hagar receives divine help to spare the life of her son.
- Rebekah making sure that Jacob gets the inheritance as God told her he should.
- And the longing of both Leah and Rachel for sons.
And it doesn’t stop there:
- In Exodus, it is Moses’ mother who decides she must save him, tries to hide him, pretends to abandon him in the bulrushes and gets Pharoh’s daughter to accept him as her own. She is aided by her older daughter.
- In Judges, the unnamed mother of Samson receives messages from God and assures his father, Manoah, that God intends good for them.
- In 1 Samuel, Hannah prays for a son and is blessed with several after she dedicates the first one to the Tabernacle.
- Bathsheba interceded for Solomon to make sure that David would keep his promise and make him king.
- And, of course, we find this theme in the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus.
While Joseph obeyed God and took action on behalf of his wife and son, Mary is the one who sang a song about God giving her a son (Luke 1:46-55) and pondered in her heart all that happened at this birth (Luke 2:19). She, like Eve, had “gotten a man, with the help of the LORD.”
So Eve is a description of a feminine type that is elaborated throughout the Bible. She is the “mother of all living,” who longs for a son who will defeat the serpent and his reign. She is looking for one who will grow to be a worthy man. Despite her initial hope for Cain, she realized later that Abel was the one who was qualified. When Seth was born, she said God gave him to carry on Abel’s mandate, not Cain’s. She had already realized that he was foolish rather than wise.
Lady Wisdom is mostly compared to a wife or a sister who saves a man from Madame Folly. But just as Solomon advises the son to listen to his mother, Wisdom also seems to morph into that role. She says:
And now, O sons, listen to me: blessed are those who keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and do not neglect it. Blessed is the one who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting beside my doors. For whoever finds me finds life and obtains favor from the LORD, but he who fails to find me injures himself; all who hate me love death.
Proverbs 8:32–36 ESV
So I think Eve, despite her role in human sin, became a role model of the redemptive wisdom of Proverbs, trusting God, and looking for a righteous and wise son.