I was traveling this past weekend, then spent the last 24 hours stranded in West Virginia, car transmission shot, searching for reputable repair shops. I managed just a few minutes to revisit the grace of my 14th week of teaching. But it’s a discipline I want to stick to.

There are three main lights I want to revisit from the week. Two from Ecclesiastes and one from the book of Isaiah.

I had my students visit briefly the verses of Ecclesiastes over the past 5 days. This sage of the 3rd Century BC is not tailor made for high school students. He’s a bit somber, a bit understated. “Beat down,” I describe him to the kids. His people are living under the weight of an oppressive Egyptian regime that is sucking the oxygen away from their souls. The hard-earned wisdom with which he is left, like sparse juice squeezed from a dried lemon, is perhaps better suited to those later in life. But I still want to make the introduction. I give them an overview of his place in the development of Scripture, cite a few examples of ecclesiastical pearls of wisdom, then zero in on Chapter 7.

I am very moved by the following insight, which I labor to impress upon the young minds of my students:

“Consider the work of God. Who can make straight what God has made crooked? On a good day enjoy good things, and on an evil day consider: Both the one and the other God has made, so that no one may find the least fault with him.” (Eccl. 7:13-14)

This is a profound thought; it needs to be unpacked. Verses 13 and 14, together, make clear that the “crooked” thing of verse 13 is a thing marked by the presence of evil. A thing not perfect. A thing not straight. A thing not optimal. We may find such things irksome, yet God has created them. They owe their existence to Him. They exist beneath his gaze. God has dominion over crooked things. Moreover, as part of God’s unfolding wisdom, we encounter such situations or such persons as we journey through life. We must contend with them.

Now, it’s true, we might be tempted to say: “Well, I will straighten the thing.” Or: “Well, I will disregard the thing. I will not trouble myself with it. I will move on.”

But this passage runs counter to such thoughts. For Ecclesiastes, crooked things exist within the wisdom and beneath the gaze of the Father. It is not the part of man to straighten them. It is rather the first step of wisdom to recognize that the crooked thing, the non-optimal thing, was also made by God. His wisdom is in it, like some inner logic, even if the outer form of the thing is partially or largely marred. There is wisdom in the existence of this crooked thing. And if there is wisdom in it, the wise man should not disdain it; he should engage it in wisdom. The wise man needs to be wise in his manner of contending with the things in life which do not yet bear the full mark of grace.

Put differently: the wise man will learn to look on the imperfections of the world with equanimity. With evenness of soul. He will gaze deep within such things and look for their inner logic, for the mark of the Logos within the thing. He will take his part in the work of redeeming that thing, turning it toward its telos. For all being, even imperfect, flawed being, is being created by a good God, telosed toward redemption. And the wise man or woman will know how to orient such crooked beings toward the good with a delicate, knowing touch.

Alas, who can say that they know how to do so?

That was highlight #1.

The second theme that drew my attention this week was Ecclesiastes’ perspective on the relative importance of wisdom vs political power. Ecclesiastes lived during a time when Israel was unhappily subject to Egyptian power from the south. She suffered under the mighty hand of Egyptian kings. This stark subjugation colors the worldview of Ecclesiastes and all of Israel at the time. Given this fact, you would think that Ecclesiastes would be a political-power-first kind of thinker. That he might argue that a nation should achieve political power first as a way of creating a path for the life of wisdom. So one might might think.

But twice, Ecclesiastes says the opposite. It is wisdom he counsels the soul to achieve first. Wisdom takes precedence over political power.

“Wisdom is a better defense for the wise than ten princes in the city,” he says in Chapter 7:19. Wisdom is preeminent over power, wealth and governance.

Two chapters later, he tells a compelling story that apparently he himself witnessed.  A king, with a mighty army, advances against a modest city. The king’s army lays up siege works around the town. Her fate appears sealed. But in that city, says Ecclesiastes, lives a poor man. A poor man, in whom wisdom dwells. That poor man – we are not told how – achieves the deliverance of his city against the political and military might of the advancing king. Was it because of diplomacy? Was it because of some act of military intelligence? Was it because the man’s wisdom rooted him in the divine presence and God Himself worked some mighty miracle, as God has often worked throughout the history of Israel? We aren’t told. But we know that this man’s wisdom trumps political and military power and that he achieves the deliverance of his city.

But here’s the funny thing. After the deliverance of this little city, the town forgets about the poor, modest man who worked out their military rescue. Because outside of an emergency, the wisdom of the poor man – poor in the eyes of the word, yet rich in wisdom – is seldom heeded, says Ecclesiastes.

This story seems to have an unhappy ending, but not to the mind of the stoic Ecclesiastes. For Ecclesiastes, wisdom might not be heeded in this imperfect world, but she still remains her pre-eminent light. And so he concludes:

“The quiet words of the wise are better heeded than the shouts of a ruler of fools.” (Eccles. 9:17). Would that we might hear such quiet words more often.

That was highlight #2.

The third highlight was my favorite. After we put Ecclesiastes to bed, we turn to the Major Prophets, beginning with Isaiah. I introduce the Major and Minor Prophets, the role of a prophet, the historical context of Isaiah, the Assyrian conquest, the Babylonian captivity, the deep maturation of spiritual vision that slowly unfolds and Israel’s growing insight into her ultimate mission and redemption.

And then we dive headlong into Isaiah 6. The call of Isaiah. This marvelous and direct personal encounter with God in his glory. We share in Isaiah’s gaze upon a mighty throne, the seraphim in attendance: wings covering their faces and feet, yet also two for hovering. We hear their battle cry – Holy, holy, holy! This cry of love and praise, rising from their lips, shaking the pillars of the house of God (how could such a structure shake?). We watch smoke fill the house, Isaiah standing there, before God’s throne, his hair wafting in the winds stirred up by angel wings.

Standing before the throne of God, Isaiah is overcome by the majesty of God and His purity. His goodness overpowers him. He feels he is not worthy. That he is not pure. Woe is me, he says. I am a sinful man. I live among a sinful people, and my eyes have seen the glory of the living God.

In response to this movement of soul, there follows an immediate movement of grace. An angel hastens to the throne, tongs in hand, and picks up an ember. An angel whom one of my students sketches, delivering to me her work just hours after class. That this angel can pluck embers from the throne of God tells us that this throne is a kind of flame. Which makes sense, for we know elsewhere that God is fire (Heb. 12:29). On this reading, an ember from God’s throne is a material element that is on the way but has not yet been transmuted into flame.

It is, we might say, both matter and fire; or, we could further say, it is both matter and spirit. This is why the Fathers of the Church saw, in this ember, an image of the Eucharist: Christ’s body, both matter and spirit. In any event, this piece of matter – on-the-way-to-but-not-yet-become-fire – is carried by the seraphim in his tongs; he flies to Isaiah, touches it to his lips, and declares:

“You are now pure.”

Purified of heart, Isaiah nows hears the voice of God, from the throne. It says:

“Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?”

In a fire-like reflex, Isaiah cries out, without hesitation,

“Here I am, send me.”

O density of instants! O utterance of the absolute!

I ask my students: “What do you think became of Isaiah’s life after that moment? Do you think it became simple, or complicated?

“Complicated!” They reply.

I smile and agree with this, one of their most astute replies. In the coming weeks we will see how right they are.