One and the Same

19 Monday Jun 2023

Tags

Bible Languages, Bible Study, Biblical Hebrew, Consuming Fire, Hate, Heart of God, Hebrew Letters, Hebrew Words, Holy Spirit, Indwelling Spirit, Refined in Fire, Unity

Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I continue looking at the Hebrew word sane (saw-nay) often translated by the English word “hate”.

In last week’s post, I shared an article by Chaim Bentorah where he says a nineteenth Century Hebrew master and linguist named Samuel Hirsh applies the English word “rejection” to sane rather than hate. A post on the Light of the World blog (linked below) says a closer translation of sane would be “turn aside”. This post also points out the original Hebrew picture of the word sane shows us what Hate/Rejection/Turning Aside does, not how it feels as that picture is not one of an intense negative emotion. This is a subject I’d like to explore in the upcoming weeks. For the sake of this post, I want to share some thoughts I had as I considered the different ways to translate sane.

I wasn’t sure “rejection” was thoroughly supported by the context of the passages in which sane appeared. For example, Leah was “hated” but she was not “rejected” in the sense that Jacob had nothing to do with her. On the contrary; Leah was obviously the recipient of Jacob’s attentions as she bore him children. So, she was not “rejected” in the way I think of the word which is “to have nothing more to do with” but she did not have Jacob’s heart.

I saw the same picture where scripture states God “hated” Esau. I can see a bit more support for the idea of rejection in the story of Esau but there is a passage worth noting. It is Deuteronomy 2:4-7 where God warns the Israelites to take care as they passed through the lands of the descendants of Esau saying He had given Mount Seir as their possession and not one bit of their land would be given away. The Israelites were also admonished not to meddle with them in any way and to buy any food and drink that might prove necessary. So, God “hated” Esau but did not utterly reject him in the sense that He had nothing more to do with him or his descendants. However, Esau didn’t share in God’s heart the same way Jacob did.

Since “rejection” didn’t sum up the meaning of sane for me, I looked it up on thesaurus.com hoping a list of synonyms might help fill in some of the gaps. I was especially curious to see if “incompatible” was included in the list. It was not but “cast aside” was. This fascinated me and I was reminded of something I’d just read in Andrew Murray’s commentary on the Book of Hebrews. He was speaking on Hebrews 12:1 which says, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us”. Andrew Murray quotes the latter part of that passage and writes:

“One of the first thoughts connected with a race is the laying aside of everything that can hinder. In the food he eats and the clothing he wears, how resolutely the runner puts aside everything, the most lawful and pleasant, that is not absolutely necessary to his success. Sacrifice, self-denial, giving up, and laying aside is the very first requisite on the course. Alas, it is this that has made the Christian life of our days the very opposite of running a race. The great study is, both in our religious teaching and practical life, to find out how to make the best of both worlds, how to enjoy as much as possible of the wealth and the pleasure and the honor that the world offers. With many Christians, if their conversions ever were an entering through a straight gate, their lives since never were, in any sense, a laying aside of everything that might hinder their spiritual growth. They never heeded the word, “Whosever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33). But this is what we are called to as indispensable: “lay(ing) aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily best us.” Yes, laying aside every-sin-however little it seems, however much it be our special weakness; it may not be spared. Sin must be laid aside if we are to run the race. It is a race for holiness and perfection, for the will of God and His favor; how could we dream of running the race without laying aside the sin that so easily bests us?” (Murray, Page 493)

Andrew Murray had spoken on the idea of perfection in an earlier chapter where he was discussing Hebrews 11:39-40: “’That apart from us they should not be made perfect.’ He writes, “The better thing God has provided is perfection. The word ‘perfect’, or forms of it, is used fourteen times in the epistle. The law made nothing perfect. Jesus Himself was, in His obedience and suffering, made perfect in His human nature, in His will and life and character, to us. As the Son, perfected forevermore, He is our High Priest; having perfected us forever in His sacrifice, He now brings us, in the communication of that perfection, into real, inner, living contact with God. And so, He is the Perfecter of our faith, and He makes us His perfect ones, who press on unto Perfection. And our life on earth is meant to be the blessed experience that God perfects us in every good thing to do His will, working in us what is pleasing in His sight. Apart from us, they might not be made perfect; to us, the blessing of some better thing, of being made perfect, has come.” (Murray, Page 489).

This idea, of running the race for holiness and perfection and that that perfection is ours in Jesus Christ, the Perfect One, is one that has stuck with me as I’ve sought to understand the meaning of sane. The Hebrew letters comprising sane are the Shin (ש), the Nun (נ), and the Aleph (א). The picture of the Shin is of teeth representing Sharp, to Eat, Devour, Destroy, Consume, like a fire, and is also representative of a process that repeats. The Nun represents a seed, sperm, sprout, continuation, offspring, life, activity, and emergence. The Aleph is a picture of an ox and represents strength, power, leader, master. It is also the letter that represents God Himself and Unity with God.

Thinking of sane as a devouring, consuming fire rooted in and springing from God, I am reminded of Hebrews 12:29: “our God is a consuming fire.” I am also reminded of a passage in Romans 2 which, from The Message, is, “God is king, but he’s not soft. In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change. You’re not getting by with anything. Every refusal and avoidance of God adds fuel to the fire. The day is coming when it’s going to blaze hot and high, God’s fiery and righteous judgment. Make no mistake: In the end you get what’s coming to you-Real Life for those who work on God’s side, but to those who insist on getting their own way and take the path of least resistance, Fire!” (Verses 4-8, MSG).

I recently conducted a study on the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares where I shared scriptures that spoke of each one of us being tried by the same fire. The results of this testing were good or ill based on whether or not we were united to Christ. I wonder if sane isn’t the same? Again, the Light of the World blog pointed out the original Hebrew picture of sane shows us action rather than feeling. Perhaps the same fire I welcome into every aspect of my life feels like rejection to someone who does not long to, or perhaps does not feel able to, know the heart of God. Perhaps whether we experience the consuming fire of God as sane or ahab (love) is akin to the idea expressed by Paul in his second letter to the Corinthians: “For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To the one we are the aroma of death leading to death and to the other the aroma of life leading to life” (2 Cor.: 15-16.) Perhaps the fire of God is life to us pressing ever deeper into Him but rejection to those who are not.

It is something I will meditate on in the coming days and I hope this has been food for thought for each of you as well. I will continue looking at sane next week. Until then, let us each one go on unto perfection, that perfection that is Christ in us, our hope of glory.

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

Scripture notations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

References

WORD STUDY – HATE – שׁנה | Chaim Bentorah

Hate (Sane), the Ancient Hebrew Meaning – Light of the World (wordpress.com)

Did God Really Hate Esau? – Israel Bible Weekly (israelbiblecenter.com)

Murray, Andrew, Holiest of All: A Commentary on the Book of Hebrews, Whitaker House, New Kensington, Pennsylvania, 1996, 2004

Peterson, Eugene H., The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language, NavPress, The Navigators, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 1993, 2002, 2018

Do I Not Hate Them Who Hate You?

12 Monday Jun 2023

Posted by Kate in Walking in the Way

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Biblical Hebrew, Deeper Meaning, Fulfillment, Hate, Hatred of God, Hebrew Letters, Hebrew Words, Indwelling Spirit, Love of God, Meaning

Hello and welcome to another post on Renaissance Woman!

Psalm 139 is one of my favorite Psalms. It is the first one I ever memorized in its entirety and I often use the verses contained within it as prayers and reminders. However, there is a passage towards the end of the Psalm that does feel like it doesn’t belong. It starts in verse 19 but, for the sake of this post, I want to focus on verses 21 and 22: “Do I not hate them, O Lord, who hate You? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies.”

There is an interesting story related in the Gospel of Luke Chapter 10. Verse 25 states, “And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested Him, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’” The complete Jewish study Bible begins this verse with; “An expert in Torah stood up to try and trap him by asking…” Jonathan Mitchell’s New Testament describes the man as “a certain man versed in the Law (a Lawyer and a legal theologian; a Torah expert)”. Jesus replies, “What is written in the law? What is your reading of it?” The lawyer answers, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind’ and ‘your neighbor as yourself’.” Jesus says to him, “You have answered rightly; do this and you will live.” But the lawyer, “wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’”

The story Jesus tells after the lawyer’s question is the one often called “The Good Samaritan.” It is a fascinating story with many layers to it. An important point to realize when reading it the deep and abiding hatred that existed between Jews and Samaritans. For Jesus to use a Samaritan in His story, especially when speaking to an expert in Torah, was one of those times we must pay close attention because Jesus is making a crucial point.

Who is my neighbor? As I carefully listen to the things being spoken today I do not think I stretch things if I rephrase this questions as, “who am I allowed to hate?” The answer to that appears to be found in Psalm 139: we can hate those who hate God, loathe those who rise against Him, count them our enemies. Of course, there is some difficulty in determining just who hates God. There are times when it appears obvious who hates God but it gets trickier when we come across those who claim to be believers in Jesus but don’t quite believe the right things. There are so many lines drawn and labels applied to people so we can distinguish our enemies from our friends. If you belong to my denomination, if you look like me, sound like me, believe like me then you are safe but if you don’t then you are not only against me but against God. The story of The Good Samaritan is a warning to take care because our neighbor is not who we might think. After all we humans judge by the outward appearance but God looks at the heart (1 Samuel 16:7).

And yet, we do live in a time where the heart seems to have been put on display. The headlines have been full of behaviors where I think we could point a finger and say, “those people there are obviously against God so they are the ones I can hate” but then we come up against John 3:16 which says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” and 1 John 2:2: “And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.” But then, there are passages like Psalm 11:5 “The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates” and Romans 9:13 where Paul quotes Malachi 1:2-3 saying, “as it is written, ‘Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated’.” So; God hates but His commandment to us was “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you” (Luke 6:27-28). Which is it? Was David wrong in his Psalm or could it be we don’t have an understanding of what the Bible means by hate?

As I search for an answer to that, I have to wonder why “hate” was chosen in the first place by our English Translators. My New World Dictionary defines hate as “to have strong dislike or ill will for; loathe; despise, to dislike or wish to avoid; shrink from (to hate arguments)”. There’s a note under the definition that says “hate implies a feeling of great dislike or aversion and, with persons as the object, connotes the bearing of malice.” Can this really describe our God as revealed in Jesus?

The Hebrew word used by David in his Psalm is sane (H8130, pronounced saw-nay) and is spelled Shin Nun Aleph (שנא). The Strong’s concordance defines it as “to hate (personally) enemy, foe, odious” so isn’t all that helpful in trying to understand what sane means. As I continued looking into the sane, I found articles that said “hate” was an incorrect translation of sane and “to love less” would be more accurate. Others have said that the ancient pictograph of sane is a thorn and then a seed denoting something unsettling that would be turned away from. One article says “the Hebrew view of hate was more about being hurt or wounded by something because of love being involved…When we feel pain, we want to withdraw; we are made in His image” (FirmIsrael). Chaim Bentorah has an article devoted to Psalm 139:21 and the word sane and says his studies have suggested “reject” would be better than “hate” to translate the Hebrew.

I don’t disagree with anything I read in the articles linked below (and there are some wonderful points made about how God blessed Esau even though He supposedly “hated” him-worth reading) but I see something more in the picture formed by the Hebrew letters. The Shin (ש) represents the totality of an entire process from beginning to end and means “whole, entire, intact” or “complete”. It also carries the idea of repetition in that the process is completed over and over again. Shin, with its three arms, also represents fire. Nun (נ) means “emergence” but it also means “to sprout, spread, propagate, shine, flourish, blossom”. The Aleph (א) is the letter that represents God but also is the letter that brings all of creation into unity with God. Thus, in the Hebrew word sane, I see the picture of fire rooted in God. His sane is the love of His Father’s heart that burns against anything that would keep His children from relationship with Him.

What does the sane of God look like? It does look like some harsh dealings as we read the Old Testament but each one of those instances describe the broken heart of God and His reluctance to act. (I have touched on this in my studies on evil). The fullness of the sane of God looks like Jesus coming to seek and save that which was lost. It looks like the stories of Luke 15 where, when the precious lost sheep, coin, and son are restored to their rightful place, the call is “rejoice with me!” United to Jesus Christ, One Spirit with Him, His sane burns in us. The apostle Paul is a perfect example of the sane of God manifested in a human life. As the zealous protector of the Temple, Paul hated the Christians in the dictionary definition of the world. After His encounter with the living Jesus on the road to Damascus, Paul had sane against everything that sought to keep anyone from experiencing the fullness of God. He became the one who wrote, “My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:19).

There’s a quote that’s recently been shared a great deal and it has bothered me. It’s from one of Billy Graham’s sermons and he says, “The closer you get to Christ, the more sinful you’re going to feel”. The quote is taken out of context and I have not yet had an opportunity to hear it within the entire sermon but, as it stands, I don’t agree with it. What I believe is the more the life of Christ is formed in you, the more you will sane. That is not a bad thing. Our God is a consuming fire and, as we are transformed into the image of Jesus Christ from glory to glory, the more His fire burns in us. We live rooted in Jesus Christ and His life in us shines out of us and lights the entire world. We sane anything that would seek to destroy the precious treasure of His life within us and, at the same time, that life in us is an irritant to the world.

There is so much more to be said on this. I believe understanding the sane of God is the first step toward understanding spiritual warfare and is a subject I will continue to look at in the upcoming weeks.

Until then, let us remember “that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us; we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God (2 Corinthians 5:19-20).

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Jacob I Loved, Esau I Hated – Hebrew Word for Hate — FIRM Israel

Sanay: To HATE – Hebrew Word Lessons

WORD STUDY – HATE – שׁנה | Chaim Bentorah

Did God Really Hate Esau? – Israel Bible Weekly (israelbiblecenter.com)

What Does The Word ‘Hate’ Mean In Hebrew and Greek? – Misfit Ministries

The Complete Jewish Study Bible, Hendrickson Publishers Marketing, LLC, Peabody, Massachusetts, 2016

Bentorah, Chaim, Hebrew Word Study: Beyond the Lexicon, Trafford Publishing, USA, 2014

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, William Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1972, 1976

Haralick, Robert M., The Inner Meaning of the Hebrew Letters, Jason Aronson Inc., Northvale, New Jersey, 1995

Mitchell, Jonathan, The New Testament, Harper Brown Publishing, 2019

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

Where’s Your Head At?

26 Monday Dec 2022

Posted by Kate in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Aleph, Ayin, Bible Study, Book of Isaiah, Evil, Hebrew Words, Holy Spirit, Indwelling Spirit, Isaiah 45:7, Resh, Sight, The Rule of Jesus

Hello! Welcome to the start of another week and another post on Renaissance Woman.

I am continuing my study of Isiah 45:7: “I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do all these things.” I have quoted this passage out of the New King James but there are many translations that have the word “evil” in place of “calamity”. The Hebrew word in this passage is ra and, this week, am taking a second look both at ra (רע)-evil- and ra’ah (ראה)-to see.

Ra has an entire list of meanings in the Strong’s Concordance: bad, evil, adversity, affliction, calamity, displeasure, mischief, and the list goes on. Looking at the Hebrew letters which comprise the word ra, the meaning is revealed as “allowing the eyes to rule”. The letter Resh (ר) meaning both “head or principal” and “poverty” is shown bending to the letter Ayin (ע) which means “eye, face, look, appearance, sight”.

The Resh is a fascinating letter (but then all the Hebrew letters are!). According to Mr. Haralick’s book, Resh has the energy intelligence of The Cosmic Container. With this in mind, I look at the word ra and I see the Ayin as both ruling and filling the Resh. The Resh is the letter depicting the head bowed or a poor person bent under a heavy load. The Resh bows to, looks for relief to, and looks to be filled by the next letter in the word. In the word ra that letter is the Ayin. Thus, evil is allowing oneself be ruled by the sight of the eyes, to build an identity by what is seen, and to look to be filled by what can be experienced through the senses of the body.

“Evil” is a strong word. Perhaps you are like me and define “evil” as deeds like assaults and murders. When I look at ra as I see it defined, evil deeds aren’t necessarily those awful acts and atrocities one human being commits against another. Rather, evil deeds are anything done because it first looked good and then it was affirmed by the heart and mind. Evil deeds are those things done out of the flesh.

I do think it’s important to take a moment and acknowledge eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil didn’t result in human beings only being capable of evil. The word translated “good” is tobe (H2896) and not only means “good” but also “beautiful, bountiful, kindness, prosperity, wealth.” Just as we can look at the world around us and see evil, so also do we see good. Humanity is capable of both and there are so many who choose good. Again, this is so important to acknowledge. At the same time, it is important to acknowledge partaking of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil resulted in death. While humanity is capable of great good, I think it’s obvious that good-no matter how great-has no power to impart life. That same choice set before our Parents in the Garden of Eden is placed before us today and it isn’t to choosing between good and evil: it’s choosing between death and life.

I found this idea echoed in Andrew Murray’s Commentary on the Book of Hebrews. Commenting on Hebrews 11:24-26 he writes, “We all live by faith. What we love and live in, we believe in. He who trusts and yields himself to the visible and the temporal lives an earthly, fleshly, life. He who looks to the unseen and the eternal, and joins himself to it, lives a divine and heavenly life. Between these two, faith ever has to make its choice. The clearer and more deliberate and more conscious the decision is for the unseen, the more will faith in God be strengthened and rewarded. The great difficulty in making the right choice lies in the fact that, by the victory that earthly things gained over us in Paradise, our eyes have been blinded; and the things of time, even where we acknowledge them to be of less value, have acquired, in virtue of their continual presence and their pressing claims, superior power. The great work faith has to do, and the best school for its growth and strength, is the choice of the unseen.” (Pages 471-472)

Choosing the unseen, knowing what it holds for us and why we should choose it at all, is not possible without the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is lavishly poured out on us and He also takes up residence in us. He abides with us forever. He is the Spirit of truth who dwells with us and in us. He testifies of Jesus. He guides us into all truth. He glorifies Jesus, takes what is His, and declares it to us. He is the one who opens our eyes. (See John Chapters 13-17 and Ephesians 1). Because He lives in us, we are united to Jesus who declares “I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore” (Revelation 1:18).

Which brings me to my second word: ra’ah (H7200). This is the Hebrew word which means “to see” but it also means “advise, approve, behold, consider, discern, perceive, respect.” The word does mean “to see” and is used for the act of seeing out of one’s eyes but the word is spelled Resh Aleph Hey (ראה). In this word, the Resh is bent to the Aleph rather than the Ayin and it is the Aleph that both rules and fills the Resh. The Aleph is the letter that represents God and union with God. It is as we look to, allow ourselves to be ruled by, and are filled by God Himself-the God revealed in Jesus-that we are able to choose life.

Just as “evil” is a difficult word, so is “rule”. It is a word that contains within it the idea of dominion and oppression and there is, I think, a resistance to the idea of being ruled by anyone or anything, including God. There are those who would tell us we should surrender to Jesus because it is His right to rule not only as Creator but Redeemer. They are not wrong but I would call your attention to two passages. In the first and second chapters of Ezekiel, the Prophet describes the heavens being opened. He sees the likeness of a throne with the appearance of a man above it. When Ezekiel sees this and the likeness of the glory of the Lord, he falls on his face. He immediately hears the voice of One speaking and the first thing this One says is, “Son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak to you.” Ezekiel then describes the Spirit entering him and standing him on his feet. The second passage I wish to call your attention to is found in the first Chapter of Revelation. John hears a voice and when he turns to see the Voice, he sees the glorified Jesus and falls at His feet as one dead. Jesus bends and places His right hand on him before speaking to him. If you picture it, you see God incarnate bringing Himself to John’s level so He can speak to him face to face.

Just as “we love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19) so do we bend to Him because He first bends to us. Romans 8: 8 says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” I do not bend my head to the Lord Jesus Christ because I’m afraid He’ll grind me into the dirt if I don’t properly honor Him. I want to bend my head to Him because I know Him. I know He loves me and I know He is far more capable of bringing peace and joy to the circumstances in my life than I would be if I started doing what was right in my own eyes. I bend my head trusting and resting in Him because He is both my glory and the lifter of my head (Psalm 3:3).

Imagine yourself represented by the Resh. Where is your head at? Who or what are you allowing to rule over you? There is only One worth bending to and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. Go to Him, rest in Him. He takes our burdens and yokes us to Himself promising His yoke is easy and his burden light. Yoked to Him, we walk step by step with Him. We learn from Him and find He is not dominating or oppressive but meek and humble of heart (Matthew 11:28-30).

Our clocks and calendars are about to register the start of another year. During this time, let us resolve not to be like the citizens in the parable of Jesus who said, “We will not have this man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14). Let us also resolve not to submit ourselves to someone else and their description of Jesus. Let us resolve to know Him for ourselves. Let us invite the Holy Spirit to complete His work in us and guide us into the Truth who is Jesus. Let us “come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ: that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head-Christ” (Ephesians 4:13-15).

Amen

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

(1) REISH – Secrets of the Hebrew Letters – YouTube

Bentorah, Chaim, Hebrew Word Study: Beyond the Lexicon, Trafford Publishing, USA, 2014

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

Haralick, Robert M., The Inner Meaning of the Hebrew Letters, Jason Aronson Inc., Northvale, New Jersey, 1995

Murray, Andrew, Holiest of All: A Commentary on the Book of Hebrews, Whitaker House, New Kensington, Pennsylvania, 1996,2004

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

No Matter What May Come

07 Monday Nov 2022

Posted by Kate in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Tags

Bara, Bible Study, Biblical Hebrew, Book of Isaiah, Create, Creation, Evil, Hebrew Words, Indwelling Spirit, Isaiah 45:7, Kingdom Life, One God

Good morning! Welcome to another week and another post on Renaissance Woman. This post will be my last on bara, the Old Testament Hebrew word most often translated by the English word “create”. For the sake of this study anyway as there is still a great deal to learn. As I looked up scriptures containing the word bara, I found many that stirred up questions and opened up avenues for more study. I am staying focused on Isaiah 45:7 though and thus plan to move on to taking a look at the meaning of “evil” in upcoming weeks.

Regarding bara: I am finally ready to settle on a definition. I have previously shared how there are some who say bara ought to be translated “to fatten” or “to fill” and have also shared how I find those definitions unsatisfactory for two reasons: 1) because there are other perfectly good Hebrew words used to express those concepts and 2) neither definition encompasses what the word intends to convey in the passages where it is used in scripture.

I don’t believe there is any language where a word means one thing in one place and something entirely different in another place. I have also previously shared where I plugged the different definitions for bara I’d come across into every passage where the word occurred to see if the definition worked. An excellent example is in Jeremiah 31:22 where I find: “…For the Lord has created a new thing in the earth–A woman shall encompass a man.” The definitions “to fatten” or “to fill” simply do not work in this passage. Neither does defining bara as “to do a new thing”. I was curious so I looked up the Hebrew words in this passage and it isn’t bara repeated twice. There is a different Hebrew word translated as “a new thing”: chadash (H2319) and it means “new, fresh.”

After all these weeks of study and compiling information from different sources, here is what I think is the closest and fullest definition of bara: to cause something new to come into being and grow to accomplish an intended purpose. It is long and complicated but it is a definition I find fits every occurrence of bara in the Old Testament. I find it even works in 1 Samuel 2:29 where bara is translated “to make yourselves fat” and in Joshua 17: 15 & 18 where bara is translated “to cut down”. In both instances those involved had a purpose and caused something new to come into being in order to bring that purpose about. In the 1Samuel passage that something new was a malformation of something God had ordained and the purpose was the satisfaction of selfish appetites. It was born out of greed. In Joshua, the purpose was to make a home and the new thing necessitated the removal of existing trees. In both of these cases, the purpose did originate in the minds of mankind but the bringing about the new thing was accomplished using processes and material already in existence. The same is true in the Jeremiah 31:22 passage where God is causing a new thing to come into being in order to satisfy His purpose but, while this new thing is originating in the mind of God and is something only God can do, man and woman already exist.

My point is, I don’t need to think “something out of nothing” every time I read the word “create” in scripture. This is a point I think is important when I apply my definition of bara to Isaiah 45:7: “I create evil.” What is God saying here? Is bara intending to convey the idea that God is the source of evil i.e. He caused it to come into being or does bara mean evil is the thing already in existence God will use to cause something new to come into being and grow according to His purpose? The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon lists Isaiah 45:7 under the definition “to shape or fashion new conditions and circumstances” so some scholars, at least, do not think the passage is saying God is the cause of evil.

The context of Isaiah 45:7 establishes both the Lordship and uniqueness of God. God says to the future ruler Cyrus that, no matter how great he thinks he is, God alone is God. God goes before him and has held his right hand (verses 1-3). The rest of the chapter continues to establish the absolute truth that God alone is God and I find this an important truth to have established when it comes to evil. There is a prevalent idea among believers, never outright declared but there nonetheless, that God is the God of good and Satan is the god of evil. God might have had His original intent but Satan got in there with his lie and ruined everything. God did what He could in Jesus but Satan is still ruining God’s plans.

I simply cannot go into how much the Bible refutes that so will simply use what is said in this chapter: “I am the Lord and there is no other…Truly You are God, who hide Yourself, O God of Israel, the Savior! They shall be ashamed and also disgraced, all of them; they shall go into confusion together, who are makers of idols…For thus says the Lord, Who created the heavens, Who is God…Look to Me and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am God and there is no other.” Satan is not a god neither does he wield power equal to God. Evil exists but, drawing on my study of bara, God comes down into it, makes His home in the midst of it, and destroys it forever by causing something new to come into being and grow and accomplish His purpose.

One of the best examples of this is found in the story of Joseph related in Chapters 37-50 of Genesis. Just in case someone is reading this who is unfamiliar with the story it is, briefly: Joseph is the only son of Jacob’s most-loved wife. He is also younger than his brothers, by a great many years in some cases, which makes the special attention paid to him by Jacob something difficult for the brothers to handle. Worse is the favoritism and elevation of Joseph over the other brothers, including the first-born son, which was something NOT DONE in that culture. This special treatment does appear to make Joseph act a bit like a brat. The story records him bringing a bad report of the brothers born to the maidservants to their father and then comes the sharing of his dreams. You can just imagine how this teenage kid telling his father and brothers one day they’d all bow down to him went over. I am not surprised that, when his brothers see him coming across the fields to check up on them in his fancy coat, they decide to kill him.

Two of his brothers intervene. Reuben convinces the others not to kill him but rather to drop him into a pit (or cistern). Reuben appears to have vague plans to rescue Joseph but apparently he thinks of some pressing task because he isn’t around when a caravan of slave traders comes along and Judah convinces the other brothers that, rather than killing Joseph, a better idea was to sell him to the slave traders. Joseph is taken down to Egypt and sold as a slave. I won’t relate all the ups and downs of his circumstances there but worth nothing is how Chapter 39 of Genesis stresses that “the Lord was with Joseph” and noticeably so (verses 2-3, 21, 23).

Joseph is eventually made ruler over Egypt second only to the Pharaoh and the day comes when his dreams are realized: his brothers come to Egypt and-not recognizing him-bow down to him. When Joseph finally reveals his identity to his brothers he says an interesting thing: “But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life” (Genesis 45:5). After the death of their father, still fearing Joseph might take vengeance on them, the brothers come once more before him and Joseph has this to say: “Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive” (Genesis 50: 19-20).

This is a fascinating story. Joseph sees God with him and at work in his circumstances so that he says, “God sent me before you”. But, Joseph does not ignore the fact that the intent of his brothers was evil. God no doubt could have got Joseph to Egypt a myriad of ways. Perhaps Joseph’s suffering-and the Bible makes it clear he did suffer (See Psalm 105)-would not have happened. It did happen and he did suffer because his brothers thought evil thoughts and acted on them. And yet, while those evil thoughts and actions brought about circumstances I’m sure Joseph would have avoided if the choice had been his; those very same circumstances were the ones God worked in to elevate Joseph to a position where not only the lives of his people were saved but the lives of the people of Egypt as well.

There is a passage of scripture which states, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purposes” (Romans 8:28). This passage states what I’ve seen so far in my study of “I create evil” (Isaiah 45:7). No matter who may come against me with plans of evil, God is with me. If a circumstance arises which brings evil instead of good, God is with me. Not just with me-He lives inside of me by His Spirit. That same Spirit that energized the creating Word is in me still energizing but also transforming and renewing. In Jesus Christ I live and move and have my being and He not only creates evil but makes peace.

Until next time, let us each one hold fast to the truth that we are the very temples of the Holy Spirit and, as we hold fast, may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7).

Hallelujah!

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

Note: for a comprehensive look at the story of Joseph, I recommend Joseph: A Story of Love, Hate, Slavery, Power, and Forgiveness by Dr. John C. Lennox.

References

Brown, F., S. Driver, and C. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, Eighteenth Printing, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody Massachusetts, 2018, Page 135

Green, Jay P. Sr., The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew, Greek, English, Volume 3, Authors For Christ Inc., Lafayette, IN, 1985

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

The God Who Bends

24 Monday Oct 2022

Posted by Kate in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Tags

Aleph, Bet, Bible Study, Book of Isaiah, Create, Creation, God With Us, Hebrew Letters, Hebrew Words, Indwelling Spirit, Isaiah 45:7, Resh

It’s not an ox but it is certainly an impressive set of horns

Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman!

This week I am back to my study of Isaiah 45:7: “I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do all these things”. Some translations have “evil” in place of the word “calamity” in this passage and the idea that the Lord creates evil is one difficult to swallow. This week, I continue looking at the Hebrew word bara which is most often translated “create” to see just what it really means.

In an earlier post, I mentioned a video I watched where the teacher said bara means to fatten or to fill. The teacher relates bara to the following words:

Beriy = fat

Barar = clean (the teacher points out soap comes from fat)

Barah = choice meat

Beriyt = covenant (the making of a covenant included the cutting or dividing of meat)

Biyr = fat place-bountiful

Biyrah = palace

He points out the fattening or filling that took place during the six days of creation: the first three days are days of separation but then days 4, 5, & 6 are the heavens, earth, and seas all being filled with plants and animals then the culmination of creation by God creating Mankind. I found another video on bara where the two letter root bar meaning “son of” was related to bara and this picture of mankind filling the earth with offspring confirms the meaning “to fatten” or “to fill”. (Other sources tell me bar is the Aramaic for “some of” rather than the Hebrew, which is ben, and bar in the Hebrew has a host of other meanings. Just an aside…)

I’ve already mentioned how I took that meaning and plugged it in to the various scriptures where bara is used to see if it works. It can, I suppose, so I do not entirely disagree but I do not find “to fatten” or “to fill” entirely satisfactory. When I try it in my study passage, I find “I fatten evil” doesn’t make sense to me at all. “I fill evil”…okay. If the idea is God filling evil in order to destroy it, I could come around to that definition. My reason for not wholeheartedly committing to these definitions is this: there are other Hebrew words used for fattened (or fatted in the King James English) and fill. There is the Hebrew word mashman (H4824) which means fatness but in terms of a rich dish or fertile field or robust man. There is also deshen (H1880) which means fatness or abundance and specifically the fatty ashes of sacrifice. These two words are not all: I count seven different entries in the Strong’s concordance when I look up fatness, fatted, fatter, and fattest. Why use bara? What is the difference in its intent that the Hebrew people would use it rather than one of these other words?

Then there’s male (H4390) which means “to fill or to be full of” and is used numerous times in the Old Testament. Again, with a perfectly good word meaning “to fill” why use bara if “to fill” is the intended meaning? What is the difference and why do I keep harping on it? Because, it is so important to understand what the writers of scripture intended to convey. Do the English words chosen fit the intent? How has our understanding of the definitions of these words changed over time? For instance, if we all truly believe “create” means “to make something out of nothing” then I have a problem. The idea that when God says “I create darkness” and “I create evil” in Isaiah 45:7 He means neither of those things existed until He brought them into being, I run into a contradiction. Evil is not mentioned once in creation story in Genesis 1 where God looks at everything He made and saw it was very good and then rested. Evil does show up in Genesis 2 after God plants the garden for the man He made and we see the tree of the knowledge of good and evil growing there but I plan to look more at that during my study of evil. There is nothing here to back up evil existing because God created it and, since I don’t believe the Bible does contradict itself, I will continue to seek out what create means. I will say it is crucial that none of us build our theology on one fragment of scripture but equally crucial is an understanding of what this word meant to the people who used it.

It’s important to remember the Hebrew language is pictorial. Every word is comprised of letters which are words in their own right and every letter has its basis in a picture. What is the picture that forms when we look at bara? Bara is spelled Bet (ב ) Resh (ר ) Aleph (א ). The Bet is a picture of a tent and the word Bet means “house”. I’ve already written about how we are ultimately the house of the Lord so won’t repeat what I’ve said here. Resh means poverty or head/principal. The letter is shaped like an upside down and backwards L and the picture behind it is either that of a poor person bent over from his burden or that of a bent head. The bent head is a picture of humility and submission to one who is the head but it is also a bending of the intellect in order to be understood. Think of how a teacher teaches a child. The teacher knows far more than the child but no good teacher overwhelms a child by using terms that child cannot possibly understand. No, a good teacher bends over his or her intellect and speaks to that child in a way that causes that child to learn and to grow.

How wonderful that we have a God who bends! There are many instances of His bending towards people in the Old Testament but we see this ultimate bending in Jesus. I cannot fathom what it meant for the Creator to empty Himself and become a member of His creation. If that wasn’t enough, Jesus wasn’t born in a palace or to a rich family. He wasn’t pampered from the moment of His birth and received no honors among men. And still, knowing who and what He was, that all things were given into His hands, He bent further and washed the filth of the roads from the feet of His disciples. This is our God. He is nothing like anything that has been worshipped as a god at any point in history. He is all powerful and the source of all things yet He is the God who bends.

So we have “house” and we have “poverty and head or principal” which are two concepts that ought not harmonize with each other and yet, in the paradox of the character of God, they do. Lastly, we have the Aleph. It looks like a somewhat sideways squiggly X but, in the earliest script, the Aleph was an ox head with horns which symbolizes power and leadership. So now we have house, poverty and head or principal, and power and leadership. I can see where those who define bara as “to fill” are coming from because this is the picture I see forming:

We are God’s dwelling places so our circumstances are also His. Thus, the circumstances of our lives will become the vehicle where He is seen and where we come to intimately know Him as He fills our lives with Himself. Any power evil appears to possess shrivels up and blows away in the presence of our God. Perhaps His being with us isn’t always easy to see but I am confident that, whatever evil besets us, we will be able to say like Joseph: “You meant it for evil but God meant it for good.”

I am still not satisfied with “to fill” as a definition for bara and so will be continuing to take a look at this word next week. Until then, may the Holy Spirit open our eyes to see that no matter what evil might come against us, we will not fear: Our God is with us! The Lord of hosts is with us! The God of Jacob is our refuge. (Psalm 46)

Hallelujah! Amen.

Note: Strong’s Concordance “Fatness, Fatted, etc.” entries in the Hebrew Dictionary: 4924, 1880, 2459, 8081, 75, 4770, 1277

References

Bara

Bet

Resh