Tag Archives: Exodus 14:31

Fear – Deuteronomy, Part 6

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Achan son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, from the tribe of Judah, stole some of the riches [of Jericho which had been devoted to yehôvâh].  The Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) was furious (chârâh, ויחר; Septuagint: ἐθυμώθη, a form of θυμόω; ʼaph, אף; Septuagint: ὀργῇ, a form of ὀργή) with the Israelites.[1]  I’m still considering the third occurrence of yirʼâh (ויראתך) in the Bible, the word I’d hoped would distinguish the fear of the Lord from ordinary fear.  I’ve skipped ahead a bit to explore what life was like for Israel under law as the sharp tip of the sword of divine judgment.

I notice right away that Achan stole some of the riches (chêrem, החרם) but yehôvâh was furious with the Israelites (literally, “the sons of Israel”).  Achan’s was the “perfect” crime.  No one but yehôvâh knew what he had done.  For Joshua it was business as usual.  He sent men from Jericho to Ai[2] as spies.  They reported that Ai would be easy to take: Don’t tire out the whole army, for Ai is small, the spies said.  So about three thousand men went up, but they fled from the men of Ai.  The men of Ai killed about thirty-six of them…[3]  The impact was immediate and devastating (Joshua 7:5b-9 NET):

The people’s courage melted away (mâsas, וימס) like water.

Joshua tore his clothes; he and the leaders of Israel lay face down on the ground before the ark of the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) until evening and threw dirt on their heads.  Joshua prayed, “O, Master (ʼădônây, אדני), Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה)!  Why did you bring these people across the Jordan to hand us over to the Amorites so they could destroy us?  If only we had been satisfied to live on the other side of the Jordan!  O Lord (ʼădônây, אדני), what can I say now that Israel has retreated before its enemies?  When the Canaanites and all who live in the land hear about this, they will turn against us and destroy the very memory of us from the earth.  What will you do to protect your great reputation?”

In the previous essay I wondered “if I should simply accept that yirʼâh, similar to the fruit of the Spirit, comes from God.”  At this particular moment Joshua didn’t believe—This very day I will begin to fill all the people of the earth with dread and to terrify (yirʼâh, ויראתך) them when they hear about you[4]—was a supernatural fear given by yehôvâh.  Clearly, he thought that fear originated from the uninterrupted triumph of Israel’s army: They annihilated with the sword everything that breathed…[5]  The Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) responded to Joshua (Joshua 7: 10-12 NET):

Get up!  Why are you lying there face down (Table)?  Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenantal commandment!  They have taken some of the riches (chêrem, החרם); they have stolen them and deceitfully put them among their own possessions (Table).  The Israelites are unable to stand before their enemies; they retreat because they have become subject to annihilation (chêrem, לחרם).  I will no longer be with you, unless you destroy what has contaminated (chêrem, החרם) you (Table).

Here it didn’t matter whether Joshua’s command to the army was yehôvâh’s command or whether Joshua had understood Moses correctly, for yehôvâh took full responsibility for Joshua’s command[6]: Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenantal commandment!  The one caught with the riches (chêrem, בחרם) must be burned up along with all who belong to him, because he violated the Lord’s covenant and did such a disgraceful thing in Israel.[7]  I’ve written about what happened to Achan, his sons, daughters, ox, donkey, sheep, tent, and all that belonged to him[8] elsewhere.  Here I want to consider the alternative.

Achan’s confession reads: I saw among the goods we seized a nice robe from Babylon, two hundred silver pieces, and a bar of gold weighing fifty shekels.  I wanted them, so I took them.[9]  Achan was one of the soldiers who annihilated (châram, ויחרימו) with the sword everything that breathed in the city, including men and women, young and old, as well as cattle, sheep, and donkeys.[10]  He had hacked and slashed his way through every living thing in the city to purge out wickedness from the promised land, and then became that wickedness himself.  If we fault yehôvâh for dealing with Achan and all that was his in the way that he had dealt with others we would fault Him just the same for showing Achan mercy (James 2:8-13).

But that was then; this is now (Matthew 18:32-35 NET):

“Then his lord called the first slave and said to him, ‘Evil slave!  I forgave you all that debt because you begged me!  Should you not have shown mercy to your fellow slave, just as I showed it to you?’  And in anger his lord turned him over to the prison guards to torture him until he repaid all he owed.  So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your brother from your heart.”

This is one of the places from which the fathers of the Catholic Church have derived the doctrine of purgatory.  “I have even heard elderly friends tell me how their Catholic schoolteachers would threaten unruly schoolboys with lurid descriptions of the fires of purgatory!” [11] Robert Stackpole wrote parenthetically.  I didn’t grow up Catholic so I never actually feared this particular passage.  We know that everyone fathered by God does not sin,[12] scared me as an adult returning from atheism.

It has a Logic 101 quality that spoke to me early on.[13]  So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your brother from your heart—seemed more like a clever turn of a phrase.  By the time it clicked with me it caused no fear, but granted me permission to forgive.  It helped me to locate and distinguish the Holy Spirit from that cacophony of voices, if you will (that variety of impulses, if you will not) inside me.  It gave me strength to stand against my religion and its many reasons for withholding forgiveness: “you will appear weak, they will gain an advantage, they will never learn, they don’t deserve forgiveness, only God can forgive sins,” etc.

If I examine my fear of the knowledge that everyone fathered by God does not sin, the first thing I notice is that it didn’t cause me to flee at that particular moment in my life.  I searched the Bible instead, “looking for loopholes” perhaps but seeking understanding.  The first understanding I received appealed to the philosophical bent of my mind and though it seems like a loophole to many, it helped me to locate and distinguish the indwelling Holy Spirit (Romans 7:13-20 NET):

Did that which is good, then [e.g., the law], become death to me?  Absolutely not!  But sin, so that it would be shown to be sin, produced death in me through what is good, so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful.  For we know that the law is spiritual – but I am unspiritual, sold into slavery to sin.  For I don’t understand what I am doing.  For I do not do what I want – instead, I do what I hate.  But if I do what I don’t want, I agree (σύμφημι, a form of σύμφημι) that the law is good.  But now it is no longer me doing it, but sin that lives in me.  For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh.  For I want to do the good, but I cannot do it.  For I do not do the good I want, but I do the very evil I do not want!  Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer me doing it but sin that lives in me.

Being led by the Spirit came much more slowly for me.  Mr Stackpole highlighted the problem: “the merits of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross are promised to those who repent in faith.  The real question is, What about those whose repentance was weak and half-hearted…”[14]  Purgatory wasn’t the answer in my religious circle, but the quality and quantity of heavenly rewards.  The “weak and half-hearted” would be “hippies” in the social hierarchy of heaven.  Colin Smith wrote: “I trust that you will want to join me in storing up treasures in heaven, knowing that our righteousness is a gift from God in Christ Jesus, and that we serve a generous God who promises great rewards (100x!) to those who trust him and serve him faithfully.”

I didn’t know that my righteousness is a gift from God and probably thought that would be cheating.  How could my position in the social hierarchy of heaven be a gift from God?  And the common Bible verses quoted seemed at first reading to confirm my understanding of justification by faith and sanctification by my works: If someone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss.  He himself will be saved, but only as through fire.[15]  Jesus taught, “But God said to him, ‘You fool!  This very night your life will be demanded back from you, but who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’  So it is with the one who stores up riches for himself, but is not rich toward God.”[16]  And Paul instructed Timothy, Command those who are rich in this world’s goods not to be haughty or to set their hope on riches, which are uncertain, but on God who richly provides us with all things for our enjoyment.  Tell them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, to be generous givers, sharing with others.  In this way they will save up a treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the future and so lay hold of what is truly life.[17]

Thank God I am such an accomplished sinner.  Praise God that his Holy Spirit would not “help” me earn my social position in heaven by “my” good works as He kept me hungering and thirsting for his righteousness.  I no longer feel any obligation to referee between purgatory and heavenly rewards.  Both explanations were designed to encourage me to seek first his kingdom and his righteousness[18] here and now.  Neither was as effective on me as a hunger and thirst for righteousness,[19] which I assume has come from God.

The alternative—that a hunger and thirst for Jesus’ righteousness originates with me—doesn’t scan.  I’m not that kind of guy.  A desire to be right?  That’s me.  A desire to appear righteous to you?  Okay, that’s probably me, too.  But the hunger and thirst for righteousness which I now have did not originate with me.  So what do I know about yirʼâh?

Well, I’ll start with what I don’t know: I don’t know whether yirʼâh was a supernatural fear from God or the natural result of confronting an army that took no prisoners and captured no slaves.  I know that yirʼâh was effective to accomplish God’s purpose to eradicate the wicked people who inhabited the promised land: It mustered[20] their armies to march to their deaths.  I don’t think Israel had anything like the confidence in yehôvâh which would be required to slaughter a peaceful, welcoming people.  I’m thinking that yirʼâh may have become the one Hebrew word to describe the combination of yârêʼ and ʼâman: they feared (yârêʼ, וייראו) the Lord, and they believed (ʼâman, ויאמינו) in the Lord.[21]  And I have a compelling contrast between Rahab, an Amorite prostitute and innkeeper, who feared yehôvâh and Achan, an Israelite soldier and thief, who did not.

I don’t have the hard-edged definitive kind of knowledge I like but I have enough encouragement to continue studying.  Besides, the hard-edged definitive kind of knowledge I like is really only useful for judging you—which brings me to the most bitter irony: When I take the name of yehôvâh/Jesus in vain by judging you for sins I share I lower the bar (Ezekiel 16:52-63), so to speak, and make it easier, if not expedient, for Him to show you mercy (Romans 11:29-31).  When the Holy Spirit has his way with me and I live his love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control[22] I condemn you who are not led by the Spirit of God.[23]  The only way I can live with this most bitter irony, and continue to hunger and thirst for his righteousness, is to pray daily:

“My persistent prayer for justice”[24] for all who call or have called or will call on our Father in heaven[25] “is for the mercy on which everything depends,[26] for it does not depend on human desire or exertion but on You who shows mercy, for You have consigned all to disobedience (ἀπείθειαν, a form of ἀπείθεια) so that You may show mercy to all.”[27]

If He can save an accomplished sinner such as I am, I see no reason or excuse why He can’t or shouldn’t save a sinner like you.

[1] Joshua 7:1b (NET)

[2] Joshua 7:2a (NET)

[3] Joshua 7:3b-5a (NET)

[4] Deuteronomy 2:25a (NET)

[5] Joshua 6:21a (NET)

[6] Joshua 6:16-19 (NET)

[7] Joshua 7:15 (NET) Table

[8] Joshua 7:24 (NET) Table

[9] Joshua 7:21a (NET) Table

[10] Joshua 6:21a (NET)

[11] What’s All This Talk of ‘Purgatorial Purification’? Part 2

[12] 1 John 5:18a (NET) Table

[13] It’s been a long time since I took Logic 101 so I checked again online that modus tollens is valid and found a reasonable exception.

[14] What’s All This Talk of ‘Purgatorial Purification’? Part 2

[15] 1 Corinthians 3:15 (NET)

[16] Luke 12:20, 21 (NET)

[17] 1 Timothy 6:17-19 (NET)

[18] Matthew 6:33 (NIV)

[19] Matthew 5:6 (NET)

[20] King Sihon was hardened for this purpose.

[21] Exodus 14:31 (NET)

[22] Galatians 5:22, 23 (NET)

[23] Romans 8:14 (NET)

[24] Luke 18:1-8 (NET)

[25] Matthew 6:9-14 (NET)

[26] Romans 9:14-16 (NET)

[27] Romans 11:28-36 (NET)

Fear – Deuteronomy, Part 5

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Get up, make your way across Wadi Arnon,[1] Moses’ account of the words yehôvâh (יהוה) spoke to him after all the military men had been eliminated from the community[2] continued.  Look!  I have already delivered over to you Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land.  Go ahead!  Take it!  Engage him in war!  This very day I will begin to fill all the people of the earth with dread and to terrify them when they hear about you.  They will shiver and shake in anticipation of your approach.[3]

The Hebrew word translated and to terrify was yirʼâh (ויראתך), the word I’d hoped would distinguish the fear of the Lord from ordinary fear.  In English to fill all the people of the earth with dread and to terrify them, causes me to wonder if I should simply accept that yirʼâh, similar to the fruit of the Spirit, comes from God, like the song says: “’twas Grace that taught, my heart to fear.  And grace, my fears relieved.”  The Hebrew word translated to fill was nâthan (תת).  It was also translated I have already delivered (נתתי) in I have already delivered over to you Sihon the Amorite, and is giving (נתן) in the land the Lord our God is giving us.[4]

The Hebrew word translated engage in Engage him in war was gârâh (והתגר), to grate, to anger, to cause strife, stir up, contend, meddle.  Moses’ tactic was to send messengers with an offer of peace.

Numbers 21:21, 22 (NET)

Deuteronomy 2:26-29 (NET)
Then Israel sent messengers to King Sihon of the Amorites, saying, “Let us pass through your land; we will not turn aside into the fields or into the vineyards, nor will we drink water from any well, but we will go along the King’s Highway until we pass your borders.” Then I sent messengers from the Kedemoth Desert to King Sihon of Heshbon with an offer of peace:  “Let me pass through your land; I will keep strictly to the roadway.  I will not turn aside to the right or the left.  Sell me food for cash so that I can eat and sell me water to drink.  Just allow me to go through on foot, just as the descendants of Esau who live at Seir and the Moabites who live in Ar did for me, until I cross the Jordan to the land the Lord our God is giving us.”

I admit to wondering whether Moses’ tactic betrayed his unfaithfulness toward yehôvâh, or duplicity toward King Sihon.  Either way it didn’t alter the outcome.

Numbers 21:23a (NET)

Deuteronomy 2:30, 31 (NET)
But Sihon did not permit Israel to pass through his border… But King Sihon of Heshbon was unwilling to allow us to pass near him…
…because the Lord our God had made him obstinate and stubborn so that he might deliver him over to you this very day.  The Lord said to me, “Look!  I have already begun to give over Sihon and his land to you.  Start right now to take his land as your possession.”
…he gathered all his forces together and went out against Israel into the wilderness.

It didn’t matter because the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) our God (ʼĕlôhı̂ym, אלהיך) had made him obstinate, literally, hardened his spirit.  The Hebrew word for hardened was qâshâh (הקשה), translated ἐσκλήρυνεν (a form of σκληρύνω) in the Septuagint.  He also had made Sihon stubborn, literally, made his heart obstinate.  The Hebrew word for obstinate was ʼâmats (ואמץ), to be strong, alert, courageous, brave, stout, bold.  It was translated  κατίσχυσεν (a form of κατισχύω) in the Septuagint.[5]  Look!  I have already begun to give over Sihon and his land to you, yehôvâh reiterated.  Start right now to take his land as your possession.

Numbers 21:23b, 24a (NET)

Deuteronomy 2:32-35 (NET)
When he came to Jahaz, he fought against Israel. When Sihon and all his troops emerged to encounter us in battle at Jahaz…
But the Israelites defeated him in battle… …the Lord our God delivered him over to us and we struck him down, along with his sons and everyone else.
At that time we seized all his cities and put every one of them under divine judgment, including even the women and children; we left no survivors.  We kept only the livestock and plunder from the cities for ourselves.

We call this genocide and fault yehôvâh for commanding it (or assume that He did not).  I won’t mount an elaborate defense here except to say that this is how law works to purge out wickedness (Deuteronomy 21:18-21 NET):

If a person has a stubborn, rebellious son who pays no attention to his father or mother, and they discipline him to no avail, his father and mother must seize him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his city.  They must declare to the elders of his city, “Our son is stubborn and rebellious and pays no attention to what we say – he is a glutton and drunkard.”  Then all the men of his city must stone him to death.  In this way you will purge out wickedness from among you, and all Israel will hear about it and be afraid (yârêʼ, ויראו).

So that was then; this is now (Matthew 5:38-48 NET):

“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’  But I say to you, do not resist the evildoer.  But whoever strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well [Table].  And if someone wants to sue you and to take your tunic, give him your coat also.  And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two.  Give to the one who asks you, and do not reject the one who wants to borrow from you [Table].

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor’ and ‘hate your enemy.’  But I say to you, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be like your Father in heaven, since he causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.  For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Even the tax collectors do the same, don’t they?  And if you only greet your brothers, what more do you do?  Even the Gentiles do the same, don’t they?  So then, be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Fankly, in our natural selves we care little more for the latter than the former commandment.  We are like children sitting in the marketplaces who call out to one another, “We played the flute for you, yet you did not dance; we wailed in mourning, yet you did not weep.”[6]  But before we call yehôvâh cruel or Jesus naïve, we who want to follow Him would do well to deny ourselves.  When we do we may notice that the Israelites defeated [Sihon] in battle because the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) our God (ʼĕlôhı̂ym, אלהינו) delivered him over to [them]:

Numbers 21:24b-26a, 31, 32 (NET)

Deuteronomy 2:36, 37 (NET)
…and took possession of his land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, as far as the Ammonites, for the border of the Ammonites was strongly defended. From Aroer, which is at the edge of Wadi Arnon (it is the city in the wadi), all the way to Gilead there was not a town able to resist us – the Lord our God gave them all to us.
So Israel took all these cities; and Israel settled in all the cities of the Amorites, in Heshbon, and in all its villages.  For Heshbon was the city of King Sihon of the Amorites…
So the Israelites lived in the land of the Amorites.  Moses sent spies to reconnoiter Jaazer, and they captured its villages and dispossessed the Amorites who were there.
However, you did not approach the land of the Ammonites, the Wadi Jabbok, the cities of the hill country, or any place else forbidden by the Lord our God.

In other words, here Israel obeyed yehôvâh, killing only those who were under divine judgment (châram, ונחרם) and taking only the land that was promised.  The law reads: Whoever sacrifices to a god other than the Lord (yehôvâh, ליהוה) alone must be utterly destroyed (châram).[7]  Nevertheless no devoted offering (chêrem, חרם) that a man may devote (châram, יחרם) to the Lord (yehôvâh, ליהוה) of all that he has, both man and beast, or the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed; every devoted offering is (chêrem, חרם) most holy to the Lord (yehôvâh, ליהוה).  No person under the ban (chêrem, חרם), who may become doomed to destruction (châram, יחרם) among men, shall be redeemed, but shall surely be put to death.[8]

If we stop blaspheming yehôvâh for a moment, thinking He has no right to make such laws, we can begin—using the very laws I quoted above—to grasp what He meant when He spoke through the prophet Ezekiel.

Ezekiel 20:11 (NASB) Ezekiel 20:25 (NASB)
I gave them My statutes and informed them of My ordinances, by which, if a man observes them, he will live. I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live…

We aren’t told how many parents, if any, brought their drunken rebellious sons before the elders of the city that they might be stoned to death.  I can surmise that some parents remained silent or lied about them, while others with means bribed elders to redeem them.  It’s fairly clear that many a drunken rebellious son rose to become an elder who led the people of Israel into πορνεία (Ezekiel 20:28, 30 NASB):

When I had brought them into the land which I swore to give to them, then they saw every high hill and every leafy tree, and they offered there their sacrifices and there they presented the provocation of their offering.  There also they made their soothing aroma and there they poured out their drink offerings…Therefore, say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God, “Will you defile yourselves after the manner of your fathers and play the harlot (zânâh, זנים; Septuagint: ἐκπορνεύετε, a form of ἐκπορνεύω) after their detestable things?

Paul wrote about the law in ways quite similar to yehôvâh’s words through Ezekiel.

Romans 7:10b (NET) Galatians 3:21b (NET)
So I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life brought death! For if a law had been given that was able to give life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law.

I wrote about this elsewhere.  Here I want to skip ahead to begin to explore what life was like for Israel under law as the sharp tip of the sword of divine judgment, and to present an example of yirʼâh which resulted in fear and faith in yehôvâh.  Outside Jericho just before the rams’ horns sounded and the city’s wall collapsed, Joshua gave the army of Israel the following command (Joshua 6:17-19 NET):

The city and all that is in it must be set apart (chêrem, חרם) for the Lord, except for Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in her house, because she hid the spies we sent.  But be careful when you are setting (châram, תחרימו) apart the riches (chêrem, החרם) for the Lord.  If you take any (chêrem, החרם) of it, you will make the Israelite camp subject to annihilation (chêrem, לחרם) and cause a disaster.  All the silver and gold, as well as bronze and iron items, belong to the Lord.  They must go into the Lord’s treasury.

I looked to see if yehôvâh commanded this.  So far all I’ve found was Moses’ command: You must burn the images of their gods, but do not covet the silver and gold that covers them so much that you take it for yourself and thus become ensnared by it; for it is abhorrent to the Lord your God.  You must not bring any abhorrent thing into your house and thereby become an object of divine wrath along with it.  You must absolutely detest and abhor it (chêrem, חרם), for it is an object of divine wrath (chêrem).[9]  A few commentators considered Jericho a kind of first fruits offering to yehôvâh.

The exception made for Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in her house is interesting.  The somewhat crass tit-for-tat cited above—because she hid the spies we sent—doesn’t quite tell the whole story (Joshua 2:1-7 NET).

Joshua son of Nun sent two spies out from Shittim secretly and instructed them: “Find out what you can about the land, especially Jericho.”  They stopped at the house of a prostitute (zânâh, זונה; Septuagint: πόρνης, a form of πόρνη) named Rahab and spent the night there.  The king of Jericho received this report: “Note well!  Israelite men have come here tonight to spy on the land.”  So the king of Jericho sent this order to Rahab: “Turn over the men who came to you – the ones who came to your house – for they have come to spy on the whole land!”  But the woman hid the two men and replied, “Yes, these men were clients of mine, but I didn’t know where they came from.  When it was time to shut the city gate for the night, the men left.  I don’t know where they were heading.  Chase after them quickly, for you have time to catch them!”  (Now she had taken them up to the roof and had hidden them in the stalks of flax she had spread out on the roof.)  Meanwhile the king’s men tried to find them on the road to the Jordan River near the fords.  The city gate was shut as soon as they set out in pursuit of them.

What she did is exactly as Joshua reported.  As James asked rhetorically, was not Rahab the prostitute also justified by works when she welcomed the messengers and sent them out by another way?[10]  But I think her reasons, why she defied her king to do what she did, are far more interesting in this study of yirʼâh (Joshua 2:8-13 NET).

Now before the spies went to sleep, Rahab went up to the roof.  She said to the men, “I know the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) is handing this land over to you.  We are absolutely terrified (ʼêymâh, אימתכם) of you, and all who live in the land are cringing (mûg, נמגו) before you.  For we heard how the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you left Egypt and how you annihilated the two Amorite kings, Sihon and Og, on the other side of the Jordan.  When we heard the news we lost our courage (mâsas, וימס) and no one could even breathe for fear of you.  For the Lord (yehôvâh, יהוה) your God (ʼĕlôhı̂ym, אלהיכם) is God (ʼĕlôhı̂ym, אלהים) in heaven above and on earth below!  So now, promise me this with an oath sworn in the Lord’s (yehôvâh, ביהוה) name.  Because I have shown allegiance (chêsêd, חסד; Septuagint: ἔλεος, literally, mercy) to you, show allegiance (chêsêd, חסד; Septuagint: ἔλεος, literally, mercy) to my family.  Give me a solemn pledge  that you will spare the lives of my father, mother, brothers, sisters, and all who belong to them, and rescue us from death.”

Though Rahab didn’t use all of Moses’ words, given her testimony—the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below—and her plea for mercy, I feel confident thinking that she feared (yârêʼ, וייראו) the Lord, and [she] believed (ʼâman, ויאמינו) in the Lord.[11]  She was as saved as anyone in Israel: Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, her father’s family, and all who belonged to her.  She lives in Israel to this very day because she hid the messengers Joshua sent to spy on Jericho.[12]  As the writer of Hebrews declared: By faith Rahab the prostitute escaped the destruction of the disobedient, because she welcomed the spies in peace.[13]  Everyone else: Israel annihilated (châram, ויחרימו) with the sword everything that breathed in the city, including men and women, young and old, as well as cattle, sheep, and donkeys…they burned the city and all that was in it, except for the silver, gold, and bronze and iron items they put in the treasury of the Lord’s house.[14]

But the Israelites disobeyed the command about the city’s riches.  Achan son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, from the tribe of Judah, stole some of the riches.[15]  I’ll continue this in another essay.

Fear – Deuteronomy, Part 6

Back to Fear – Deuteronomy, Part 7

[1] Deuteronomy 2:24a (NET)

[2] Deuteronomy 2:16 (NET)

[3] Deuteronomy 2:24b-25 (NET)

[4] Deuteronomy 2:29b (NET)

[5] A translation of the Septuagint reads: hardened his spirit and prevailed over his heart.

[6] Matthew 11:16b, 17 (NET)

[7] Exodus 22:20 (NET)

[8] Leviticus 27:28, 29 (NKJV)

[9] Deuteronomy 7:25, 26 (NET)

[10] James 2:25 (NET)

[11] Exodus 14:31 (NET)

[12] Joshua 6:25 (NET)  This verse also provides a clue that Joshua was written during Rahab’s lifetime.  See: “An Introduction to the Book of Joshua”

[13] Hebrews 11:31 (NET)

[14] Joshua 6:21, 24 (NET)

[15] Joshua 7:1a (NET)

Fear – Exodus, Part 5

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The next occurrence of yârêʼ[1] in Exodus is found in the song Moses and the Israelites sang…to the Lord.[2]  It was a song of praise and thanksgiving, looking back to the events when the Egyptian army chased them through the sea:  I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously, the horse and its rider he has thrown into the sea.[3]  The chariots of Pharaoh and his army he has thrown into the sea…[4]  The depths have covered them, they went down to the bottom like a stone.[5]  Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods?  Who is like you? – majestic in holiness, fearful (yârêʼ) in praises, working wonders?[6]

The rabbis who translated the Septuagint chose θαυμαστὸς.[7]  One of the definitions of θαυμαστὸς in the NET online Bible is “1c) causing amazement joined with terror.”  So the word is a legitimate choice, but something in me still wonders if “marvelous in expectation” (θαυμαστὸς ἐν δόξαις[8]) carries any of the sense of the costliness of Israel’s salvation that I perceive in the linkage of fear (yârêʼ) and praise (tehillâh).[9]  I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked (râshâʽ),[10] the Lord told Ezekiel.  How much less in the death of those He had hardened and those who followed them into battle?

Though θαυμαστὸς does not appear in the New Testament in its root form, the first occurrence was Jesus’ question to the chief priests and elders.  “Have you never read in the scriptures: ‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.  This is from the Lord, and it is marvelous (θαυμαστὴ, a form of θαυμαστός) in our eyes’”?[11]  Whatever my concern about the costliness of Israel’s salvation, as well as my own, it is harder to miss when Yahweh Himself—not Egyptian military officers and soldiers—died for us, in our place.

After writing that I walked away.  It felt like I was straining at gnats and still not getting to the root of what was gnawing at me.  I did other things.

When I walked to the Redbox to satisfy my daily movie fix I had already decided to rent “Killing Them Softly.”  I didn’t know why.  I had avoided it because I heard it was excessively violent, and because I had worked for Linara (the only woman in the cast) on another film she co-produced with her husband.  Ordinarily, I would have run to see a movie with someone I knew in it.  But I had overheard her talking about being topless in the scene with James Gandolfini.  Between the violence and my own indecision (whether I wanted to see Linara or her breasts in action) I had put it off until that evening.

It was an underworld crime story set in the turmoil of the 2008 economic crisis and presidential election.  Brad Pitt played a mob enforcer.  Linara’s topless work had been cut, but she played well with the big boys, Pitt and Gandolfini.  There was a heavy-handed capitalists-are-like-gangsters theme, and no real ending.  It seemed primed for “Killing Them Softly 2” where the mysterious “corporate types,” who hired Brad Pitt’s character Jackie through an intermediary, would be revealed as they hired someone to kill Jackie, and possibly their intermediary.  I don’t think the movie did well enough financially to warrant a sequel however.  And then I went to bed.  But when I awoke the next morning lines from the movie were buzzing around in my head.  They actually helped me clarify what I was thinking about cultivating fear in Exodus the day before.

This is a spoiler alert for anyone who finds a movie ruined by knowing its story.

The story got started when John Amato (aka Squirrel) hired Frank and Russell to rob a mob card game run by Markie Trattman.  They thought they could get away with it because Trattman had robbed his own card game years earlier.  He withstood the enhanced interrogation techniques Dillion the enforcer used on him, but when the subject came up in another card game with his cronies he couldn’t stop laughing, and confessed the whole thing.  Everybody liked Markie so they let it slide.  Squirrel assumed that Trattman would be the primary suspect if his own card game was robbed again, that he would be killed, and then that would be the end of it.  He rightly perceived that cultivating a righteousness based on fear was more important to the powers-that-be than recovering the money.

Squirrel had an insight into mob righteousness.  He didn’t want Russell on the job because his attitude and manner would invite confrontation.  “Then you gotta…shoot somebody,” he told Frank, “and I don’t want that.  There’s no reason for that, you know?  You don’t get any more money…”  What he failed to realize was that Jackie (Dillion’s replacement as mob enforcer) was smart enough to know that Markie Trattman was too smart to think that he could get away with it twice.  Jackie immediately suspected other culprits.  And he had a firm grasp on fear based righteousness, too.

Jackie lobbied with the Counselor (the intermediary for the corporate types running things) to kill Trattman anyway and correct the real issue:  “It don’t make a bit of difference if Trattman did it or someone did it to Trattman,” Jackie explained.  “If people think he did it and he’s still walking around, you’re gonna have kids waiting in line to knock them…games over.”

Jackie even had a fear based redemption scheme for Frank.  Frank had to confess where Squirrel would be and then witness the execution, or be executed himself.  “I got to be there and everything?” Frank whined.  “Frank, you made a mistake,” Jackie explained patiently.  “Now you gotta show you understand you made a mistake.  And you gotta make things right…”

As they waited in the car for Squirrel to arrive, Frank tried to intercede for him: “Look, Jackie, he’s not a bad guy, you know?  I mean, he’s not a bad guy at all.”

“None of them are, kid.  They’re all nice guys.”

Then Jackie got out of the car and shot Squirrel with a shotgun from across the parking lot, because he liked “killing them softly…from a distance, not close enough for feelings.”  Of course, he did walk across the parking lot and finish the job up close.  And he wasn’t that far from Frank when he shot him in the head.  Ultimately, Jackie’s fear based redemption scheme didn’t fare well against the necessities of fear based righteousness.

None of this is to say that I think God is, or was, like a mob enforcer.  My question is, why did One with foreknowledge put Himself in the position to be mistaken for a mob enforcer by wicked people?  (Who among us hasn’t wished for God to get those guys, those evildoers, or wondered incredulously why He waits so long?)  The answer that comes to me is that God risked it for my benefit, that I might know the difference between fear based righteousness and Holy Spirit based righteousness (faith is integral to both: When Israel saw the great power that the Lord had exercised over the Egyptians, they feared the Lord, and they believed in the Lord…[12]).

Israel, like Frank, was compelled to participate in and witness the destruction of the Egyptian army.  Then at Sinai they experienced a non-lethal fear as they stood at the base of a mountain, described as something like a volcano in full ash eruption,[13] and lived to tell the tale:  All the people were seeing the thundering and the lightning, and heard the sound of the horn, and saw the mountain smoking – and when the people saw it they trembled with fear (nûaʽ)[14] and kept their distance.[15]  The word translated fear here was φοβηθέντες (a form of φοβέω)[16] in the Septuagint.  After Jesus calmed the storm with a word his disciples were afraid (φοβηθέντες) and amazed, saying to one another, “Who then is this?  He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him!”[17]

Do not fear (yârêʼ), Moses said, for God has come to test you, that the fear (yirʼâh)[18] of him may be before you so that you do not sin.”[19]  The rabbis who translated the Septuagint chose θαρσεῖτε (a form of θαρσέω)[20] for Do not fear.  It is the same Greek word Jesus used when the disciples saw Him walking on the water and were terrified that he was a ghost:  Have courage (θαρσεῖτε)!  It is I.[21]  For yirʼâh, the fear of him, the rabbis chose φόβος.[22]  And Zechariah, visibly shaken when he saw the angel, was seized with fear (φόβος).[23]

When I began this study I hoped to find a clear delineation between the fear that puts to flight and the reverence that binds and draws one to God.  A cursory look at the concordance seemed to justify that hope in the words yârêʼ and yirʼâh.  The first occurrence of yirʼâh in Abraham’s explanation to Abimelech—I thought that there would be no one here who has reverence (yirʼâh) for God[24]—was translated θεοσέβεια[25] in the Septuagint and I thought I was on the way.  It is a compound of θεός[26] and σέβομαι,[27] the reverence or worship that is negated by the ἀσέβειαν (a form of ἀσέβεια)[28] of people that brought the wrath of God in Romans 1:18.

I also expected to find that the fear of the Lord was something different, something other than a conviction to act in accordance with the word of the Lord, the functional equivalent in the Old Testament of the fruit of the Spirit,[29] the desire and the effort brought forth by God for the sake of his good pleasure,[30]  because it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy,[31]  and the love of God[32] that is the fulfillment of the law.[33]  That equivalence took me by surprise and has colored everything.  The Good News Translation of the Bible captured the essence of fear based righteousness when the translators (paraphrasists?) skipped the middle man as it were in their paraphrase of yirʼâh.  Don’t be afraid (yârêʼ); Moses said, God has only come to test you and make you keep on obeying (yirʼâh) him, so that you will not sin.[34]

So this alchemist’s notion of deriving reverence (σέβομαι) for God from the human fear (φόβος) of death or punishment seems like a doomed enterprise from the very beginning, a folly of the religious mind.  It was difficult enough to title an essay “Paul’s Religious Mind,” so I did not and will not call this “God’s Religious Mind.”  But that is what I’m thinking.

Why would an Omniscient One with foreknowledge embark on such a futile course?  Again, I can only assume that it was for my benefit.  I am the one, after all (and probably not the only one), whose knee-jerk reaction to the way of righteousness (for other evildoers, of course) is swifter “justice,” harsher punishment and longer prison sentences.  But does anyone really believe that those things produce righteousness?  (Does anyone really believe that our municipal, county, state or federal governments can afford to do this anymore?)

In that light I can’t help but see the giving of the law at Sinai as a massive psychological experiment to test the power and potential of fear based righteousness.  The finding of this particular experiment was forty days.[35]  After forty days the descendants of Israel returned to the worship practices[36] they learned in Egypt.[37]  And they did this 1) after witnessing the destruction of the Egyptian army; 2) after seeing Mount Sinai…completely covered with smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire, and its smoke went up like the smoke of a great furnace, and the whole mountain shook violently;[38] and 3) after agreeing to abide by a covenant[39] that they would not sacrifice to a god other than the Lord alone [or] be utterly destroyed.[40]

[2] Exodus 15:1a (NET)

[3] Exodus 15:1b (NET)

[4] Exodus 15:4a (NET)

[5] Exodus 15:5 (NET)

[6] Exodus 15:11 (NET)

[10] Ezekiel 33:11 (NET)

[11] Matthew 21:42 (NET)

[12] Exodus 14:31 (NET)

[15] Exodus 20:18 (NET)

[17] Luke 8:25 (NET)

[19] Exodus 20:20 (NET)

[21] Mark 6:50 (NET)

[23] Luke 1:12 (NET)

[30] Philippians 2:13 (NET)

[31] Romans 9:16 (NET)

[33] Romans 13:10 (NET)

[38] Exodus 19:18 (NET)

[40] Exodus 22:20 (NET)

Fear – Exodus, Part 4

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Here I continue to see the Lord cultivating the fear that is a conviction to act in accordance with his word in Israel.  It happened at midnight – the Lord attacked all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the captive who was in the prison, and all the firstborn of the cattle.[1]  But the plague of the firstborn did not touch the Israelites who heard the word of the Lord and marked their doors with the blood of the Passover lamb: For the Lord will pass through to strike Egypt, and when he sees the blood on the top of the doorframe and the two side posts, then the Lord will pass over the door, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you.[2]

Pharaoh got up in the night, along with all his servants and all Egypt, and there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was no house in which there was not someone dead.  Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron in the night and said, “Get up, get out from among my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, serve the Lord as you have requested!  Also, take your flocks and your herds, just as you have requested, and leave.  But bless me also.”[3]

And so the descendents of Israel (and others) left Egypt:  There were about 600,000 men on foot, plus their dependants.  A mixed multitude also went up with them, and flocks and herds – a very large number of cattle.[4]  A note in the NET reads: “The ‘mixed multitude’ (עֵרֶב רַב, ’erev rav) refers to a great ‘swarm’ (see a possible cognate in 8:21[17]) of folk who joined the Israelites, people who were impressed by the defeat of Egypt, who came to faith, or who just wanted to escape Egypt (maybe slaves or descendants of the Hyksos). The expression prepares for later references to riffraff who came along.”

In this context of cultivating a fear of the Lord that is a conviction to act in accordance with his word I begin to see a purpose for hardening Pharaoh’s heart (Exodus 14:1-4 NET).

The Lord spoke to Moses: “Tell the Israelites that they must turn and camp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea; you are to camp by the sea before Baal Zephon opposite it.  Pharaoh will think regarding the Israelites, ‘They are wandering around confused in the land – the desert has closed in on them.’  I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will chase after them.  I will gain honor because of Pharaoh and because of all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.”  So this is what they did.

It happened as the Lord promised Moses (Exodus 14:5-7 NET):

When it was reported to the king of Egypt that the people had fled, the heart of Pharaoh and his servants was turned against the people, and the king and his servants said, “What in the world have we done?  For we have released the people of Israel from serving us!”  Then he prepared his chariots and took his army with him.  He took six hundred select chariots, and all the rest of the chariots of Egypt, and officers on all of them.

If I am correct in seeing this fear that is a conviction to act in accordance with the word of the Lord as the functional equivalent in the Old Testament of the fruit of the Spirit,[5] the desire and the effort brought forth by God for the sake of his good pleasure,[6]  because it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy,[7]  and the love of God[8] that is the fulfillment of the law,[9] then the contemporary Gentile response to the events of Exodus is telling.  It is a clear revelation of the ασεβεια[10] in human hearts, the ungodliness (ἀσέβειαν, a form of ἀσέβεια) and unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth by their unrighteousness;[11] namely, the learned consensus that the Exodus didn’t happen as described in the Bible.  It is difficult to believe that God would do such things for anyone (the descendents of Israel), let alone for everyone (For God has consigned all people to disobedience so that he may show mercy to them all.[12]).

But orchestrating the events to cultivate such a fear could have the opposite effect, creating a fear that caused Israel to flee, in their hearts if not with their feet (Exodus 14:10-12 NET).

When Pharaoh got closer, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians marching after them, and they were terrified (yârêʼ).[13]  The Israelites cried out to the Lord, and they said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the desert?  What in the world have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt?  Isn’t this what we told you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone so that we can serve the Egyptians, because it is better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!’”

The rabbis who translated the Septuagint used ἐφοβήθησαν (a form of φοβέω)[14] here.  The next occurrence of ἐφοβήθησαν in the New Testament is in Matthew’s Gospel when Christ, our Passover lamb, [was] sacrificed.[15]  Now from noon until three, darkness came over all the land.  At about three o’clock Jesus shouted [the opening line of Psalm 22] with a loud voice…“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”[16]  Apparently some bystanders didn’t know Aramaic (the language of Judah’s Babylonian/Persian captors and didn’t recognize the Psalm in that ancient tongue: Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani? [8/19/2017: For a different take on this see, DID THE MESSIAH SPEAK ARAMAIC OR HEBREW? (PART 2) BY E.A.KNAPP]).  They said, This man is calling for Elijah[17] (e.g., Eli, Eli—My God, My God).  Leave him alone!  Let’s see if Elijah will come to save him.[18]

Then Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit.  Just then the temple curtain was torn in two, from top to bottom.  The earth shook and the rocks were split apart.  And tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had died were raised….Now when the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and what took place, they were extremely terrified (ἐφοβήθησαν, a form of φοβέω) and said, “Truly this one was God’s Son!”[19]

I doubt that the Centurion and his companions on Golgotha saw the curtain that separated the holy place from the most holy place ripped, though they may have seen or at least heard the commotion afterward.  I assume they witnessed the earthquake and the tombs opening.  Whether they saw any of the dead come out of their tombs depends on how limiting verse 53 is meant to be taken, They came out of the tombs after his resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.[20]  I’m not sure I can make that kind of determination based only on ἐκ,[21] which can mean out of or away from.  But whatever they saw and heard frightened them like the Israelites were frightened when they looked up, and there were the Egyptians marching after them.

But Moses, who was privy to God’s plan, said, Do not fear (yârêʼ)!  Stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord that he will provide for you today; for the Egyptians that you see today you will never, ever see again.[22]  The word translated fear above was θαρσεῖτε (a form of θαρσέω)[23] in the Septuagint.  When Jesus’ disciples saw him walking on the water they were terrified and said, “It’s a ghost!” and cried out with fear.  But immediately Jesus spoke to them: “Have courage (θαρσεῖτε)!  It is I.  Do not be afraid.”[24]

Israel crossed the sea on dry ground.  The Egyptians were drowned when they attempted to follow.  When Israel saw the great power that the Lord had exercised over the Egyptians, they feared (yârêʼ) the Lord, and they believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses.[25]  And so, for the moment, God had successfully cultivated that combination of faith and fear that is the functional equivalent of: if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved,[26] and the fruit of the Spirit,[27] the desire and the effort brought forth by God for the sake of his good pleasure,[28]  because it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy,[29]  and the love of God[30] that is the fulfillment of the law.[31]

[1] Exodus 12:29 (NET)

[2] Exodus 12:23 (NET)

[3] Exodus 12:30-32 (NET)

[4] Exodus 12:37b, 38 (NET)

[6] Philippians 2:13 (NET)

[7] Romans 9:16 (NET) Table

[11] Romans 1:18 (NET)

[12] Romans 11:32 (NET)

[15] 1 Corinthians 5:7b (NET) Table

[16] Matthew 27:45, 46 (NET) Table

[17] Matthew 27:47 (NET)

[18] Matthew 27:49 (NET)

[19] Matthew 27:50-52, 54 (NET)

[20] Matthew 27:53 (NET)

[22] Exodus 14:13 (NET)

[24] Matthew 14:26, 27 (NET)

[25] Exodus 14:31 (NET) There are no more occurrences of ἐφοβήθη (the word the rabbis chose in the Septuagint) in the New Testament.

[26] Romans 10:9 (NET)

[28] Philippians 2:13 (NET)

[29] Romans 9:16 (NET)