The LORD possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old.
All Commentaries on Proverbs 8:22 Go To Proverbs 8
Bede
AD 735
The Lord’s “ways” are his works, through contemplation of which man has arrived at faith or knowledge of him. “For his invisible nature was seen by the rational creatures of the world through what he had made.” His ways are the illuminations through which he showed himself both to angelic spirits and to human minds. He possessed wisdom at the beginning of his ways because he had the Son with whom he arranged all things at the beginning of the nascent created order. Yet, lest anyone think that the Son began to exist at the beginning of his ways or at any other time, it adds vigilantly, … “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God; all things were created through him.” Let them perish, therefore, who deny that “the power of God and the wisdom of God,” clearly Christ, was begotten by the Father himself from the beginning and indeed before any beginning that could be thought or expressed. In another translation, this passage begins, “The Lord created me at the beginning of his ways in his works.” The fathers understand this saying to be about the Lord’s incarnation, maintaining that by the grace of a certain mystery it said “the Lord created me,” and not “the Father created me.” The flesh, they say, acknowledges the Lord, glory indicates the Father, creation confesses the Lord, and charity knows the Father who is the beginning. It could also read “in the beginning of his ways”; for he himself said, “I am the way,” because he began the journey of his church to the kingdom of God, to eternal life, when he rose from the dead. It adds “in his works” because he was born from a virgin for the purpose of redeeming the works of the Father, receiving flesh to liberate the Father’s works from slavery to corruption, for the flesh of Christ exists for the sake of his works, whereas his divinity precedes them. –.
