These books of the Bible, despite their differences, all treat the phenomenon of what it means to live wisely before God. In this readable commentary, Davis points out that the writers of these books considered wisdom - and the fruits of wisdom, a well-ordered life and a peaceful mind - to be within the grasp of anyone wholeheartedly desiring it.
The author takes seriously the fact that these books are poetry—and practical poetry at that. In other words, these books aim to generate reflection on both the most ordinary and the most far-reaching experiences of life: birth and death, poverty and wealth, education and work, grief and joy, human love and love of God. To the Israelite sages, the sacred and the secular were not separate realms of experience and concern. And these books, as Wisdom Literature, can speak with particular power to the spiritual needs of our highly secularized age.