Embodiments of the invention are generally directed to a system and method for persisting software objects. In an embodiment, objects are scanned with object introspection to identify the members of the object. The members are transformed into an intermediate data structure. The scan and transformation process can be influenced with configurable rules. If the object references another object, then the process is repeated recursively on the other object. Thus, in an embodiment, an entire object closure may be scanned and transformed into the intermediate data structure. The intermediate data structure is persisted in a data store.