Wisdom has built her house, she has hewn out her seven pillars:
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Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
[Wisdom said] to the unwise, “Come, eat my bread, and drink the wine which I have mingled for you.” In these words, surely, we recognize that the wisdom of God, the Father’s coeternal Word, has built a house for himself, namely, a body in the virgin’s womb. And to this body, as to the head, he has united the church as his members, has “slain” his martyrs as “victims,” set his “table” with bread and wine in allusion to the priesthood according to Melchizedek, and called the weak and unwise.
Because it had spoken sufficiently of the divinity of Christ, it goes on to speak of the humanity he assumed. “Wisdom has built her house,” therefore, because the Son of God created the man whom he received into the unity of his person. “She has set up her seven pillars.” She erected churches throughout the world by the sevenfold grace of the Spirit to be his home, that is, the mystery of his incarnation, lest the memory for believing, worshiping and preaching be destroyed by the wickedness of the faithless, as though they remained together by supporting each other. Or at least the house of wisdom is the church of Christ, while the pillars are the doctors of the holy church filled by the sevenfold Spirit, such as James, Peter and John. Wisdom undoubtedly “raised up these pillars because it elevated the minds of preachers who were detached from love of the present age for the purpose of bearing the work of his church.” .
The Holy Spirit through Solomon shows forth the type of sacrifice of the Lord, making mention of the immolated victim and of the bread and wine and also of the altar and of the apostles. “Wisdom,” he says, “has built a house and she has set up seven columns. She has slain her victims, mixed her wine in a chalice, and has spread her table.” … He declares the wine is mixed, that is, he announces in a prophetic voice that the chalice of the Lord is mixed with water and wine.
House. The sacred humanity, (St. Ignatius; St. Augustine, City of God xvii. 20.) or the Church. (St. Gregory, Mor. xxxiii. 15.)
Here we may receive all instruction, the seven sacraments, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Pleasure had mentioned her attractions: now those of true wisdom are set before us. (Calmet)
God sent his pastors at all times, to invite people to embrace the latter. They are all included in the number seven, both before and under the law, as well as in the gospel, where St. Paul styles Sts. Peter, James, and John, pillars, Galatians ii. This is the literal sense, on which the mystical is grounded, and both are intended by the Holy Spirit, intimating that the uncreated wisdom took flesh of the blessed Virgin Mary, prepared the table of bread and wine, as Priest according to the order of Melchisedec, and chose the weak of this world to confound the strong, as St. Augustine explains this passage. (Sup. and q. 51.) (Worthington)
We may also not inappropriately interpret the “pillars of heaven” as the churches themselves. Being many in number, they constitute one catholic church spread over the whole face of the earth. So, too, the apostle John writes to the seven churches, meaning to denote the one catholic church replenished with the Spirit of sevenfold grace, and we know that Solomon said of the Lord, “Wisdom has built her a house; she has hewn out her seven pillars.” And to make known that it was of the seven churches he had spoken, which sedulously introduced the very sacraments themselves also, he says, “She has killed her sacrifices, she has mingled her wine, she has also set forth her table.” .
We say, therefore, that when he said in his previous discourse that wisdom built a house for itself, he is speaking enigmatically about the formation of the Lord’s flesh. For true wisdom did not live in someone else’s building but built a home for itself from the Virgin’s body. .
Christ, [Solomon] means, the wisdom and power of God the Father, has built his house, that is, his nature in the flesh derived from the virgin, even as [John] said beforetime: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” [As likewise the wise prophet Solomon] testifies: Wisdom that was before the world, and is the source of life, the infinite “wisdom of God, has built her house” by a mother who knew no man—to wit, as he assumed the temple of the body. “And has raised her seven pillars,” that is, the fragrant grace of the allholy Spirit, as Isaiah says: “And the seven spirits of God shall rest upon him.” [But others say that the seven pillars are the seven divine orders which sustain the creation by his holy and inspired teaching: namely, the prophets, the apostles, the martyrs, the hierarchs, the hermits, the saints and the righteous.] .
St. Hippolytus On Prov. IX. 1, Wisdom Hath Builded Her House.
Christ, he means, the wisdom and power of God the Father, has built His house, i.e., His nature in the flesh derived from the Virgin, even as he (John) has said beforetime, The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us. As likewise the wise prophet testifies: Wisdom that was before the world, and is the source of life, the infinite Wisdom of God, has built her house by a mother who knew no man—to wit, as He assumed the temple of the body. And has raised her seven pillars; that is, the fragrant grace of the all-holy Spirit, as Isaiah says: And the seven spirits of God shall rest upon Him, But others say that the seven pillars are the seven divine orders which sustain the creation by His holy and inspired teaching; to wit, me prophets, the apostles, the martyrs, the hierarchs, the hermits, the saints, and the righteous. And the phrase, She has killed her beasts, denotes the prophets and martyrs who in every city and country are...
Christ, he means, the wisdom and power of God the Father, has built His house, i.e., His nature in the flesh derived from the Virgin, even as he (John) has said beforetime, The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us. As likewise the wise prophet testifies: Wisdom that was before the world, and is the source of life, the infinite Wisdom of God, has built her house by a mother who knew no man—to wit, as He assumed the temple of the body. And has raised her seven pillars; that is, the fragrant grace of the all-holy Spirit, as Isaiah says: And the seven spirits of God shall rest upon Him, But others say that the seven pillars are the seven divine orders which sustain the creation by His holy and inspired teaching; to wit, me prophets, the apostles, the martyrs, the hierarchs, the hermits, the saints, and the righteous. And the phrase, She has killed her beasts, denotes the prophets and martyrs who in every city and country are slain like sheep every day by the unbelieving, in behalf of the ...
He intends the new Jerusalem, or the sanctified flesh. By the seven pillars he means the sevenfold unity of the Holy Spirit resting upon it; as Isaiah testifies, saying, “She has slain” her “victims.”
“Wisdom has built her house, and has set seven pillars.” Since wisdom is the Son of God, once he became man he built his house, that is, the flesh from the Virgin. He [Solomon] calls the seven pillars “the spirit of God, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and piety, the spirit of the fear of God,” as Isaiah says. [Solomon] also calls the church “house” and the apostles “pillars.” The wise individual is the one who is safe and selfsufficient, lacking nothing. As the house of wisdom is the church, the pillars are those who appear to be pillars in the church. Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon, Fragment
It was the Holy Ghost that gave fecundity to the Virgin, but it was from a body that a real body was derived. And when “Wisdom was building herself a house,” “the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us,” that is, in that flesh which he assumed from a human being and which he animated with the spirit of rational life.
We are his flesh, the flesh that had been taken up from the Virgin’s womb. If this flesh had not been from ours, that is, had it not been truly human, the Word made flesh would not have dwelt among us. “He did” in fact “dwell among us,” however, for he made the nature of our body his own. “Wisdom built itself a house,” not from just any material but from the substance that is properly ours. The fact that he had taken it on has been made clear from when it was said, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” .
