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I Can’t See Clearly

21 Monday Mar 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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I have great fun studying the Bible.  I never know what I’m going to learn and yet I always know I’m going to learn something new about the Father revealed in Jesus.  It’s an adventure every time.  Which doesn’t mean it’s easy.  I will start studies and find I’m utterly confused.  It is difficult to come to a study without preconceived notions about what the study passage means.  I have a background where I’ve experienced different denominations and each one has left behind echoes of its belief systems. I read commentaries and expositions on the passages I study that tell me these passages mean one thing and then, through conducting my own studies, I find these passages mean the exact opposite.

I have already mentioned reading interpretations of Isaiah 45:7 where I’m told God is saying he “permits” or “allows” darkness.  The Hebrew word there is “create” and is translated such in other passages.  That God says He creates darkness was not easy to understand once I discovered I came to this passage with a bone deep conviction that the light is good and the darkness is bad.  I wasn’t aware I felt this way until I was deep into the study and analyzing just what it was I already believed compared to what I was uncovering.  Just over the last week there have been multiple times I’ve either read or heard someone say “Jesus is the light that shines in our darkness”.  That is absolutely true: He is.  Yet I’ve been listening with every fiber of my being not just to the words but the intent and feeling of the context in which they are spoken and I find others have this same conviction that the darkness is bad the light is good.  More than that, I see this conviction carries into how we believers view ourselves: I was bad while in darkness and now that I’m in the light Jesus makes me good.  Is this true?  If God created the darkness, and Isaiah 45:7 directly quotes Him as claiming He did; did He create something bad?

The Hebrew word in Isaiah 45:7 for darkness is choshek (H2822) and is defined in the Strong’s Concordance as: “from 2821, the dark; hence (literally) darkness; figuratively misery, destruction, death, ignorance, sorrow, wickedness–dark(-ness), night, obscurity.”  This doesn’t sound good at all and yet this exact word is the same one for darkness in Genesis 1 which God calls “night”.  Night isn’t bad, it just is.  And yet, if I read slowly and carefully, I find that in verse 4 God sees the light, that it was good and then divides the light from the darkness.  In verse 5 He calls the light “Day” and the darkness “Night” and then the First Creation Day comes to a close.  God never actually calls the darkness “good” although verse 31 says, “Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good.”  These are all interesting points, but I don’t find an answer to my question.

I open the Strong’s Concordance to the scripture listings of occurrences of “darkness” and begin to look at them.  At once, I find the subject of darkness to be far more complicated than I imagined.  There are eleven Hebrew words translated “darkness” in the Old Testament and an additional five Greek words in the New.  I am currently focusing on the Hebrew words and some aren’t distinct per se from choshek but rather are familial words and come from the same root.  For example, Psalm 139:12 says, “Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You, but the night shines as the day; The darkness and the light are both alike to You.”  The first occurrence of darkness is my study word choshek but the second is chashekah (H2825).  According to the Strong’s Concordance, this word is also from 2821 and is defined as “darkness, figuratively misery”.

The two words translated “darkness” in Job 28:3 are a different story.  My New King James Version has this verse translated, “Man puts an end to darkness and searches every recess for ore in the darkness and the shadow of death.”  The first occurrence of darkness is again choshek but the second is ophel (H652) and means, “dusk–darkness, obscurity, privily.”  For those of you wondering: privily is the adverb form of privy and means, “private, hidden, secret, clandestine.”  Here we do have two different words coming from different roots and with different meanings although they’ve been translated by the same English word.  As I continued to look at scriptures containing my study word, I found plenty more to confuse me.  There are scriptures where my study word means physical darkness or night.  This is true in Genesis 1 and is also true in passages like Exodus 14:20.  And yet, while the meaning of darkness or obscurity doesn’t change, there are far more occurrences where “darkness” is used in a metaphorical rather than physical sense.  I found this to be true in many passages of Job, Proverbs, and Psalms but reading all of these did not make it any easier to discern whether darkness was good or bad.

Chapter 20 of Job is titled “Zophar’s Sermon on the Wicked Man” and verse 26 states, “Total darkness is reserved for his treasures”.  Those who lose their treasures would call this bad but there are many who would call it good.  Then I read in Isaiah 45:3 quotes God as saying, “I will give you treasures of darkness and hidden riches of secret places.”  There is nothing bad here at all.  Proverbs 2:13 speaks of men who “leave the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness,” which of course is bad.  But then Psalms 107 speaks of those who rebelled against the words of God (very bad) and thus sit in darkness and in the shadow of death; when they cried out to the Lord in their trouble He saves them out of their distresses and “brings them out of their darkness and the shadow of death” (verses 10-16).  That’s good: the darkness was no match for God.  Then, most confusing of all, I read in Amos: “Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord!  For what good is the day of the Lord to you?  It will be darkness, and not light” (Amos 1:18).  The darkness does sound bad in this passage but how can it be in any way associated with such a certainly good thing as the day of the Lord?

Good or bad.  How can I know?  I certainly can’t rely on my own judgment because there have been so many bad things that have happened to me and yet, as the transforming light and life and love of Jesus has come in to the circumstance I called bad and redeemed it, it has become good.  I can attest to the truth of Romans 8:28: “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”  Nor can I rely on anyone else’s judgment because one person will say a thing is bad and another will say the very same thing is good.  I can attest to the truth of Isaiah 5:20: “woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.”

I think a great deal about the first few chapters of Genesis, specifically the two trees named in the Garden.  There was the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life.  I have a book I have not yet read in its entirety but there’s a passage that has stuck with me.  The book is Is God to Blame? by Gregory A. Boyd.  He addresses the Serpent’s lie in the first chapter and writes, “Our role as God’s creatures is to receive, enjoy and reflect our Creator’s love and goodness as we exercise the authority over the earth he entrusted to us.  But we can’t do this if we try to be wise like God, “knowing good and evil”.  To fully reflect God’s image in the way he intended, we must resist the serpent’s temptation to be “like God” in the way God has forbidden.  Unlike God, our knowledge and wisdom are finite.  We simply are not equipped to make accurate and loving judgments about good and evil…When we try to go beyond this boundary and try to know what God alone can know, when we try to be “wise” like God, it destroys us.” 

I don’t yet know whether I agree or disagree with this statement.  Perhaps the truth is closer to I see where Mr. Boyd is coming from but, in Jesus; I have His life and mind and wisdom because His Spirit lives in me and teaches me to think as He thinks and know as He knows.  “In Jesus” is, I think, the key.  I find my confusion begins to clear when I cease trying to understand darkness in terms of good and bad and begin to think of it in terms of Life of Jesus Christ and Not-life of Jesus Christ.  Can there be life in the midst of darkness?  Since life is Jesus, His life is the light of us all, and the life and light that He is shines in the darkness, then I would say that answer is yes.  I would also say this subject of darkness requires further study.

Unless noted otherwise, all scriptures are quoted from The New King James Version of The Holy Bible, Thomas Nelson, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

  1. Boyd, Gregory A., Is God to Blame? Beyond Pat Answers to the Problem of Suffering, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, Illinois, 2003, Page 23
  2. Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, William Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1970/1976
  3. Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

The Nature of Light

21 Monday Feb 2022

Posted by in Studies

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I’m not sure how I took this-my hands might have been shaking-but I thought it was cool.

I am continuing in my study of Isaiah 45:7, specifically the study of light.  The Hebrew word for light in my passage is owr (H216) and has a fairly basic definition: illumination, luminary (in every sense including lightening, happiness, etc.), bright, clear, day + light (ening), morning, sun.  The Hebrew word translated light in my passage is the same word translated light in Genesis 1:3, “And God said, ‘Let there be light’”.  I was curious to see if I could learn anything from this but, as I went through other scriptures where owr is used, I wasn’t getting any light on the matter (ha ha).

In the Genesis Account, plants are created before the sun, moon, and stars.  The Word of God declares, “…let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night: and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth” (Genesis 1:14-15).  The light of Genesis 1:3 cannot be sunlight and I was curious what my science books had to say on the subject.

In John Wiester’s book The Genesis Connection, he writes, “The Universe began at a sharply defined instant in time in a fiery explosion of intense brilliance.  In the beginning, pure energy was transforming itself into matter.  One of the greatest contributions of nineteenth-century physics was the statement of the law of conservation of energy.  In essence this law says that energy can change form, but it is never destroyed.  Thus in the Big Bang, pure energy would alter itself into forms of matter about which we can only theorize.  The first particles to emerge were photons (particles of light) and neutrinos (subatomic particles that travel through solid bodies at the speed of light).  These were almost instantaneously followed by electrons, positrons, protons, and neutrons.  Initial temperatures were beyond comprehension, such as one hundred thousand million degrees.  The Universe was filled with light.” 

I found a similar quote in Mind Maps: Physics by Dr. Ben Still: “It is thought our universe started with a Big Bang.  Before this event, there was nothing, including no space for things to move in, or time to grow old by.  At some point, some quantum fluctuation triggered energy, space, and time to be unleashed.  In the first moments, the universe expanded outward into the nothing faster than the speed of light, a tiny period of time known as inflation.  Space and time unfurled like a carpet as the universe doubled in size many times over until it reached about the size of a golf ball.  This young universe, much less than one second old, was very hot, as huge amounts of energy were confined to a very small space.  In the moments that followed, energy was converted into different forms, including the mass of many fundamental particles.  Strong interactions almost immediately bound quarks into baryons and mesons, while electrons and other leptons stood by as spectators.  At just minutes old, the universe was a plasma of electrically charged particles, each sharing energy through the exchange of light.”

Both of these quotes paint fascinating mental pictures for me.  That beginning must have been glorious and beautiful beyond explanation.  I am awed at the thought but don’t feel I am gaining any insight into what light actually is.  I continued to peruse both books and in Dr. Ben Still’s book, found a section titled “The Strange Behavior of Light.”  In Mr. Wiester’s book, I found: “Light is the key to all life in this world.  It is the form of energy that is necessary for all life on Earth.  It is an imperfectly understood gift that behaves as both a wave and a particle to provide the energy upon which all life ultimately depends.”

In reading both books, I got the sense that scientists don’t fully understand light and my attention was captured by Mr. Wiester’s words, “imperfectly understood.”  I was reminded of 1 John 1:5 which says, “This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.”  Like the created light that, while studied and knowledge is growing all the time remains imperfectly understood, so does the God who is light remain imperfectly understood.  Or, He would if He had not chosen to reveal Himself to us.  All through the Old Testament we have God revealing Himself but this revelation is piecemeal.  No one person had a complete picture.  There are promises like this one in Isaiah: “The Sun shall no longer be your light by day, nor for brightness shall the moon give light to you; But the Lord will be to you an everlasting light, and your God your glory” (60:19).  And then, in the fullness if time, every promise was fulfilled.

The Word became flesh and, in Jesus, we see the final, full, and complete revelation of God.  John’s Gospel says,”No one has seen God at any time.  The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (John 1:18).  Light can now be perfectly understood. 

My study has only touched on the darkness mentioned in Isaiah 45:7 as I have looked up scriptures and seen darkness and light mentioned together.  I have not looked at all at the word “evil” in the passage and I am interested to see where the study goes as I look at the words that carry a negative connotation.  What I can say for certain at this point is that I have often quoted scriptures like, “…that in all things He might have preeminence” (Colossians 1:18) and “God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name” (Philippians 2:9) without fully understanding what they mean.  As I study, I am convinced that Jesus is everything.

Jesus Christ is Lord.  Jesus Christ is my Salvation, my Peace, my Rest, my Inheritance, my Promised Land, my Health, my Mind, my Source, my Very Life.  In Jesus is Life.  That life was, is now, and always shall be the light of all mankind.  In Him all the promises of God are Yes!  This day we declare; “Arise!  Shine!  For our light has come!  And the glory of the Lord is risen upon us!” (Isaiah 60:1).

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all scriptures are quoted from The New King James Version of The Holy Bible, Thomas Nelson, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Still, Dr. Ben, Mind Maps Physics: How to Navigate the World of Science, 1st Edition, Unipress Books Limited, 2020

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

Wiester, John, The Genesis Connection, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1983

Discovering the Light

14 Monday Feb 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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This week I am returning to my study of Isaiah 45:7 and am continuing to look at the word “light”.  I have written about seeing a picture of The Word being compressed into the human Jesus.  More than that, a cell in the womb of the Virgin Mary.  One of my Bible teacher’s recently mentioned there is a spark of light when a sperm fertilizes an egg.  This phenomenon was first recorded in mice but has since been recorded in humans as well.  It is sparks of zinc exploding and the effect is like fireworks.  This is an amazing discovery and yet this explosion of light is something that takes place on a biological level.  It’s a mechanism of creation. 

What took place when the Creator became the creation?  I cannot imagine.  All scripture gives me is a taste of the miracle that took place.  Scripture states the Holy Spirit “overshadowed” Mary.  That word in the Greek is episkiazo (G1982) and means “to cast a shade upon, to envelop in a haze of brilliancy, to invest with preternatural influence-overshadow”.  The picture of Mary being enveloped in a haze of brilliancy-light-and the Light of the world bursting into being in her womb is beautiful to me.  Light begat Light.

Fascinating as this thought is, I must put it on a back burner as I am in danger of digressing from my study.  I see the light that is Jesus in Isaiah 45:7 but perhaps I am way off.  Perhaps God is merely declaring Himself as Creator. Reading further in the chapter I find verse 12 where God says; “I have made the earth and created man on it” so the idea of Creator and creation is in the chapter.  I have read commentaries and other blog posts on this passage and, almost to a one, I find the insistence that what is meant here is that God permits darkness and evil but is not responsible for it.  And yet, the English word “create” is the translation of the Hebrew word and is translated the same in other places.  The Hebrew is bara (H1254) and is the same word found in Genesis 1:1: In the beginning, God created (or bara-ed) the heavens and the earth.

I find the same Hebrew words for darkness and light in my Isaiah passage in the verses 2 and 3 of Genesis.  In Genesis 1:1 God baras the heavens and the earth.  In Genesis 1:2 darkness-choshek in the Hebrew-is on the face of the deep.  In Genesis 1:3 God says “Let there be light”-owr in the Hebrew-and there is light.  The words are the same as my passage in Isaiah but the pattern is different.  Darkness is mentioned before light and, in Genesis, the light is brought into being and not formed.  The word yatsar does not appear anywhere in the story of creation.  I think something other than the act of creating is being spoken about in my Isaiah passage but I’d like to be certain.

An integral part of any study I do is to look to other translations of the Bible to see how verses have been rendered.  As I read through, I do have my thought strengthened that Isaiah 45:7 is not referencing creation.  Every translation carries the idea of a way of living.  Consider the New American Standard: “The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these.”  The Young’s Literal Translation is especially interesting because instead of using the word “creating”, Mr. Young says “preparing darkness” and “preparing evil”.

While the translations are helpful, they are not at all helpful.  In fact, I find I am confused.  Whether or not this passage is referencing the act of creation or is speaking of Jesus, how can that same God who the New Testament stresses IS love create darkness and evil?  Some translations have disaster or calamity in the place of evil but the different words don’t soften what feels like a blow.  The Amplified appears to share my confusion because that translation renders this verse as; “I form the light and create darkness; I make peace [national well-being. Moral evil proceeds from the will of men, but physical evil proceeds from the will of God], and I create [physical] evil-calamity; I am the Lord Who does all these things”.  I like the Amplified Bible and use it a great deal but in this passage I do not get the sense the translators are expanding the text to show the nuances of the original language. Rather, this feels like an insistence that God didn’t really mean what He says here.  What He REALLY means is…I move on to other sources.

I look up the meaning of light (Strong’s number H216) in Wilson’s Old Testament Word Studies.  At first, Wilson’s appears to be directing me back to the light created in Genesis 1:2.  The entry begins with, “…light is that subtle fluid, called into existence the first day of creation; as this material element of nature was created before the sun, so it appears to subsist independent of that body (see Job 38: 19, 24) to which it is attracted as a centre, and flows back in powerful agency through the solar system to every planet included in it.”  If the definition stopped here, so would I and yet, I read further: “Light is put for life, natural and spiritual…life signifies prosperity, honour, joy…light in darkness is encouragement, comfort, or good hope in adversity…light, in a spiritual sense, attributed to God, to Christ, hence the saving knowledge of God and of Christ.”  This is helpful for me to gain understanding of the nuances of the meaning of light but I don’t feel as if I yet understand. 

I move on to the Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon and find the first precise attribution of the definition of light to the Messiah.  I read the entry and, under #9, find, “light of instruction so the Messianic servant is light, the advent of Messiah is shining of great light”.  Rabbi Benjamin Blech writes, “What was the original light of Day One in the week of creation?  It could not have been sunlight.  The sun was not created until the Fourth Day.  It was a light of far greater intensity.  It was a light, according to our Sages, set aside for the future of Messianic fulfillment.”

Am I certain that Isaiah 45:7 is speaking of Jesus and thus holds spiritual truths to be discovered? I am certain there are truths to be discovered but am still not certain as to the meaning of the passage, especially considering the fact that the Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic the Bible was originally written are all dead languages and thus translations and renderings are subject to debate regarding their preciseness.  I have seen enough to say there’s solid reasoning to believe there is something more than God’s creating light meant here but then I’ve seen enough to wonder if the light mentioned in Genesis 1 doesn’t mean something more than light created.

Chaim Bentorah shares a story of a man who asked a rabbi a certain question.  The rabbi gave his answer and the man excitedly said, “You’re right!”  Then another rabbi, overhearing the answer, joined the conversation and explained why the first rabbi was wrong and gave his own answer, which was the total opposite of the first.  The man who’d’ asked the original question got excited again and declared to the second rabbi, “You’re right!”  A third rabbi entered the conversation and said, “He’s right, and he’s right?  They both can’t be right.”  The man pointed to the third rabbi and announced, “You’re right.”

It’s a story that makes me chuckle but one I think all believers should take to heart.  As I seek to discover the meaning of Isaiah 45:7, I am certain of one thing: there is nothing to fear because this passage makes clear there is no power above God.  Does the fact that this passage states God creates both darkness and evil shake my faith in any way?  No.  This is where relationship is so important.  I know Him.  He is real in my life and has proven Himself trustworthy, faithful, and good in the midst of both well-being and calamity.  Because I know Him, I do not doubt His character or His love for me.  I also know I have a great deal to learn and thus, praying for the Holy Spirit to guide me and interpret for me, I continue my study.

References

Scientists Just Captured The Flash of Light That Sparks When a Sperm Meets an Egg (sciencealert.com)

New American Standard Bible, A.J. Holman Company, La Habra, California, 1960-1977

The Comparative Study Bible, Zondervan Bible Publishers, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Bentorah, Chain, Hebrew Word Study: Revealing the Heart of God, Whitaker House, New Kensington, PA, 2016, Page 317

Blech, Benjamin, The Secrets of Hebrew Words, Jason Aronson, Inc., Northvale, New Jersey, 1991, Page 30.

Brown, Francis, D.D., D. Litt., The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts, Eighteenth Printing-September 2018, 1906

Green, Jay P., The Interlinear Bible Hebrew Greek English Volume One, Authors for Christ, Lafayette, Indiana, 1976-1985

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

Wilson, William, Wilson’s Old Testament Word Studies, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts

Young, Robert, Young’s Literal Translation of the Holy Bible, Revised Edition Old Testament, Baker Books, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1898, Reprinted 1995

Fruit of the Spirit-Longsuffering

19 Monday Apr 2021

Posted by in Fruit of the Spirit, Studies

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“But the fruit of the Spirit is…longsuffering” Galatians 5:22

Longsuffering made for an interesting study.  I’m an avid reader and I can’t count how many times I’ve read the phrase, “a longsuffering sigh.”  To me, longsuffering carries the connotation of deep sighs, eye rolls, biting one’s tongue, and attempting to control one’s temper.  Longsuffering does not immediately equal fruit of the Spirit in my mind. 

Different translations of the Bible translate this word in different ways.  The King James has “longsuffering” while the Amplified has “patience” and expands that with “even temper, forbearance”.  Both the New American Standard and New International have “patience” while my New International Version Journal Bible has “forbearance”.  I can’t say forbearance is any more appealing to me than longsuffering and neither is patience, really.  I can’t shake the feeling of negativity associated with these words.  Whenever I think of longsuffering, forbearance, and patience; I picture someone stiff, almost frowning.  Why?

I find the beginning of an answer to that in The New World Dictionary’s entry for patience.  After the definition, I found a section on synonyms which states: patience implies the bearing of suffering, provocation, delay, tediousness, etc. with calmness and self-control…endurance stresses the capacity to bear suffering or hardship…forbearance implies restraint under provocation or a refraining from retaliation for a wrong…stoicism suggest such endurance of suffering without flinching as to indicate an almost austere indifference to pain or pleasure.

Austere is a good word and that helps me to understand what I’m picturing.  While I read the words patience, longsuffering, forbearance, I am actually thinking stoicism.  This is why I find study so necessary to my Christian life.  I bring preconceived meanings to scripture when I read it and I often find words do not mean what I think they mean.  I did not find any surprises in the definitions for the Greek word translated patience but was able to begin looking at it in a different way.  I did unearth some buried treasure as I dug deeper into the word which I’ll get to in a moment.

Impatience is something I struggle with.  I did not think my struggle was having patience with people although, while conducting this study, I am thinking the Holy Spirit does have some work yet to do in this arena.  I do struggle with being patient with God’s process.  It takes such a long time.  There have been many times I have been frustrated with God because His will is that I know him, my will is that I know Him, let’s get on with it!  Zero to Overcomer in less than 60 seconds.  He is not a God of the Zaps.  No, He is a God of process.  (See 2 Corinthians 3:18)

One of the most difficult words I receive from my Heavenly Father is “Wait.  Be still.”  It is especially difficult when I’ve been waiting years for some answers and His response is still “Wait.  Be Still.”  Obedience to My Father can become a burden rather than my delight and I am relieved when I realize patience is something that flows out of His life within me because it is not something I am capable of having on my own. 

The meanings of “wait” and “be still” are a help to patience bearing fruit.  “Wait” and “Be still” are not commands to thumb-twiddling.  The “wait” as in “Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say on the Lord!” (Psalm 27:14) is the Hebrew word qavah (H6960) and means “to bind together by twisting, to expect”.  “Be still” as in “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10) is the Hebrew word raphah (H7503) and means “slacken, abate, cease…let alone…be slothful”.  That does sound a bit like thumb-twiddling but that’s not the picture I see.  I see a letting go of my need for things to happen in my NOW and, instead, I focus on entering into Jesus’ rest.  I choose to look at the waiting time as opportunity to be knit together with Jesus through the work of His Spirit and the time is not spent in idleness.  I see that patience is not passive, neither is it stoic.

Now, for the buried treasure:

I tracked the Greek word for patience (makrothumia G3115) to its root words and found makros (G3117) and thumos (G2372).  Under Strong’s entry for thumos was the suggestion to compare with 5590.  I did so and found 5590 in the Strong’s concordance is the Greek psuche.  There is a long line of definitions for psuche but, put simply, it means breath.  This struck me because of how closely an even temper and patience is associated with the breath.  Even as I read the entry, I couldn’t help taking a deep breath.  I caught myself doing it and thought, “That’s exactly what I do when I’m keeping my temper.”

I recently completed a round of Physical Therapy and my therapist wanted me to focus on diaphragmatic breathing.  She told me I could do a lot for pain management if I focused on my breath.  I remembered that as I was struck by the connection between breath and patience.  I can change what’s happening in my body and how I’m feeling by changing my breath.  When it comes to fruit of the Spirit like patience, it isn’t my breath I need.

1 Corinthians 15: 45 says, “And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.”  The word for “being” is sometimes translated “soul” and is the Greek word psuche.  Genesis 2:7 tells me how this was done: “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.”  Jesus breathed on the apostles after His resurrection and then said, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:22).  The word used for the Holy Spirit is pneuma (G4151) and, while it doesn’t mean exactly the same thing as psuche, it does carry the meaning of breath.

The Newsboys have a song titled “Father, Blessed Father” on their album Adoration.  The song contains the lyrics, “Breathe on me, Breathe Oh breath of God.  Breathe on me, ‘til my heart is new.”  That is my prayer as I wrap up this study and walk into a new week.  Breathe on me, Oh Spirit of the Living God.  Be my very breath. Create in me a clean heart and may your patience bear fruit in my life.

Amen.

References:

Unless notes otherwise, scriptures are quoted from the New King James Version of the Holy Bible, Thomas Nelson, Inc. 1982

The Comparative Study Bible, The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, 2nd Edition, William Colling + World Publishing Company, 1976

Strong, James, LLD., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

The Letter of the Word

18 Monday Jan 2021

Posted by in Hebrew Words, Studies

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As I have progressed in my relationship with Jesus, I have found my study habits changing.  I suppose such a thing ought to be obvious but I noticed the change and have wondered at it.  For example, I no longer do those “Read the Bible in a Year” plans.  I do not say there is anything wrong with them.  I have enjoyed making my way through different plans-sometimes historical, sometimes chronological, and seeing different patterns emerge.  And yet, there were times when I would read a particular scripture and it would spark something in me.  I would think about taking time to study it but I could not as I had my plan to adhere to.  I would promise myself to come back to it but another year meant another plan and I didn’t have a great deal of time to devote to one scripture.

I don’t do that anymore.  Now, if I see something I sink down into that passage until the Holy Spirit directs my attention to another.  This happened during my study of John 3:5.  I wrote in a previous post how scripture references and commentaries in my different Bible translations and study materials drew my attention to Ezekiel 36: 25-27.  I commenced a word study on those verses and such vistas opened it was difficult not to travel down some of these new paths and to stay focused on what I was attempting to learn about John 3:5.  While I do not think I am finished with John 3:5 either, I’m ready to take a look at some of these trails I’ve never been down and see what I find.

I was curious about the Hebrew word used for “give” as in “I will give you a new heart”.  The word translated “put” in some of my translations (like the NKJV) as in “I will put a new spirit within you” is the same Hebrew word translated “give” only a few words before.  I wondered if it might not contain the idea of birthing but it does not.  The word is nathan: number 5414 in my copy of The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible.  There is a rather long entry for nathan and it’s worth reading through.  In sum, translating nathan as “give” is an accurate translation. 

Now, I find my Strong’s an invaluable resource but there are times merely looking up the Greek and Hebrew and getting a definition is a bit of a let down.  I have other dictionaries and commentaries which can be helpful and I have a Hebrew lexicon coded with Strong’s numbers and arranged so the word and its root are listed together along with every scripture the word is found.  Reading the word in other passages and seeing how it’s used is helpful but I can’t help wondering whether that is all I can learn.

Fortunately, I have a book called The Inner Meaning of the Hebrew Letters by Robert M. Haralick and I have Google.  With these two resources, I am introduced to a world where the Hebrew letters themselves have forms and final forms and meanings that help to show me who God is.

Take nathan: it is written nun, tav, and nun in its final form.  Before I make it passed the Table of Contents in Mr. Haralick’s book, I see that Nun means Emergence and Tav means True Law.  I find that fascinating.  Ezekiel 36:27 says “I will put (nathan) my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”  In looking at the first two letters of nathan I see God at work.  Emergence = He puts or gives and True Law = we walk in his statutes, keep His judgments, and do them.  It’s with a sense of excitement and anticipation that I read the entries for these letters.

Mr. Haralick begins his entry for nun by stating “The fourteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet is nun spelled nun-vav-nun.” (I’ve used English spelling-Mr. Haralick uses the Hebrew letters)  He goes on to say that in Aramaic, the word nun means fish while in Hebrew the word is the root to sprout, spread, propagate, or shine.  I am not unfamiliar with the word nun as I’ve read many times “Joshua, the son of Nun” and Mr. Haralick goes on to say, “Every instance of the word nun (spelled nun-vav-nun) in the Pentateuch is in the phrase “son of Nun”.  He includes the scripture references in his footnotes but reviews Deuteronomy 31:23, 1:38, and 34:9 concluding, “That which is in emergence does not immediately accomplish what is to be accomplished for what is to be accomplished takes place later in time.  It is the son of Nun, Joshua, the offspring of Nun, who goes into the land and causes us to inherit it.  The father, Nun, emergence, does not go into the Promised Land.  Therefore, when we are engaging in emergence we are charged to be strong and of good courage for it will take time for our emergence to produce something seeable.  And in emerging, we shall be full of the spirit of wisdom.”  

There are pages more information on nun, its cognates, how its meaning affects other words it is part of, and what its numerical value means.  I also found an online resource (lightedway.org) which has a study on nun so, once again, I find looking into the meaning of anything, even a letter, is no small undertaking.

For now though, I have to pause and reflect on the bit I’ve shared.  I see a picture of Jesus in Mr. Haralick’s words.  Our inheritance, our Promised Land if you will, is in Him.  He is the one that brings us to the Father and restores the relationship.  He is Yeshua, He who saves; the one who brings us into the Holy of Holies through Himself.  He is the one who puts in His life in us yet we do not immediately experience His fullness but rather, are transformed into His image from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3:18).  We can be strong and of good courage because we know that He who began a good work in us will complete it in the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6).

To Him be the glory unto the Age of the Ages.  Amen.

I drew my last paragraph from the following scriptures:  Hebrews 10:20, Colossians 1:27, John 14:6, Ephesians 1:11-17, Romans 6:23, 2 Corinthians 5:19, and James 1:17

Quotes taken from:

Haralick, Robert M., The Inner Meaning of Hebrew Letters, Jason Aronson Inc. Northvale, New Jersey, 1995, pages 207-208