ABSTRACT
It is no doubt a mark of our time and situation that for me the quest for wisdom, the object of Job’s longing, has become a question about power-a question of finding it, to be sure, but also a question of defining it and our relationship to it. I choose two figures from the book of Proverbs, the female personifications of Wisdom and Strangeness, as guides for the quest, partly because of my long scholarly acquaintance with them, partly because of the current controversy about Sophia in the Protestant churches. As female images constructed by men, they are in one sense inherently disempowering for women; they inhibit our ability to name and shape ourselves by telling us in advance who we are and may become. On the other hand, as powerful female images they tantalize the female questor/questioner of power. Could there be an imagistic surplus of power available here that is not under the control of the fashioners?
