Let us begin by returning to some more insight into other writings of Solomon/Shlomo. Ecclesiastes shares thoughts from him as a wise older man. Remember את/עד cognate permutations include עת “time.” And קהלת ↔︎ כלעת.
- Please recall we have spoken that both the focus of our striving, and its measure, are very important. And its restraint/its expression, both physical and emotional, and how that relates to time עת.
- See how “Koholet” might relate to another important time in our history, and why we will return later to the discussion of “soul,” the seat of our emotions, desires, will.
- Notice the word herb עשׂב in Genesis 3:18 above. We will see that word later in this entry.
- And to the results of restraining/expressing physically/emotionally our striving and its focus, we are to have joy in the abundance of God’s giving:
Back to Solomon, and recall כלעת above and קהלת below interchange. The conclusion of Solomon’s writings:
See In Ecclesiastes 1:14 and in 12:14, the highlighted אתכל. I believe it is not by chance that Solomon chose the name Koholet. See that this back-to-back combination אתכל occurs very frequently:
- Undoubtedly, having a glimpse of understanding Solomon, he is pointing to the importance of this combination. Restraining/expressing physically/emotionally our measure of striving and its focus.
- Recall we had said the measure of striving was cyclic, and seems to relate to all things living. There is clear connection to Genesis 8:20-22 and the resulting management of the evil of mankind’s heart vis-a-vis the remainder of creation•••
Genesis 8:20-22 NKJV
20 Then Noah built an altar to the LORD, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And the LORD smelled a soothing aroma. Then the LORD said in His heart, “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done.
22 “While the earth remains,
Seedtime and harvest,
Cold and heat,
Winter and summer,
And day and night
Shall not cease.”
See another repeated word (multiple witness) in this pericope, that begged for a deeper search אסף – here as BDB “add.” Be aware the is a recurring name Asaph (43 occurrences – at least three different people), including the author of a number of Psalms (Strong indicates the meaning as “gatherer,” interestingly also the meaning of קהלת Koholet). 🤔
- It is most interesting that, as one looks at אסף, one sees that one of its cognate permutations is חפץ, which is one of the more common words for “to will” in English translations. But, I am getting ahead of myself. Hold that thought.
- It seems there could be a number of ways to interpret what is highlighted in the קהלת exploration of Genesis 8:20-22. I will share one opinion, but it may be that it would take a random sampling of the 556 כל את occurrences to get a better idea.
- My thought on the highlights in Genesis 8:20-22 seen above with קהלת cognate permutations is this:
The evil in man’s heart is in his wanting to be in control, rather than letting God be in control. It is not that all the cycles listed in 8:22 didn’t exist prior to the flood, but God is making a statement that no matter how hard we strive to make the cycles go away in our efforts to control, they will always exist. And now you will see some of the lessons I have learned in my life, combined with those “control” thoughts:
- We strive to change the cycle of seedtime and harvest by greenhouses and indoor gardening and cold storage for produce because we want what we want year-round. And we control droughts by irrigation.
- We use “air conditioning” to control heat and cold, affecting the earth’s climate.
- We have great light pollution by trying to take away the darkness, so we can no longer visualize the vastness of Creation in the night sky.
But God says that no matter how hard we attempt to be “in control,” the cycles will remain (with additions). And the interesting thing is what is highlighted in קהלת verse 22. First is a קהלת cognate permutation in the form of “Yet כל,” the cyclic measure of striving (that is, he knows we are going to continue with our foolishness, which is, as it says, “evil from our youth.” And the second highlight in verse 22 is “and night not cease.” Return to Genesis 1:5 – “to darkness חשך he called night.” I looked to see if there were occurrences of evil רע with darkness (since man’s perspective is that night is evil – but is this God’s perspective?), and here is what I found. When the Masoretes did their “pointing,” it may be that they obscured (pun intended) an important meaning. Is it a “purposeful deviation?” Who knows 🤷🏼♂️?
1 Samuel 25:39 NKJV
39 So when David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed be the LORD, who has pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal, and has kept His servant from evil! For the LORD has returned the wickedness of Nabal on his own head.”
And David sent and proposed to Abigail, to take her as his wife.
- Here is that “restraint” word again.
Job 21:30
30 For the wicked are reserved for the day of doom;
They shall be brought out on the day of wrath.
This is reminiscent of the Parable of the wheat and tares – Matthew 13:24-30.
The “darkness,” which we are tempted to call “evil,” may rather be a restraint, a “holding back,” a necessary part of God’s design, that we simply want control over in our hope to become “gods.” Creation’s restraint of our striving in the focus of our own control of things will not cease. Rather, might we be better off to begin to back away from our efforts before we have brought things to a cataclysmic point? My thought – take it or leave it. Obviously biased. The חשך called לילה “night” will not cease. It explains so much of God and Creation, and our dance••• if you will indulge me.
First, Creation itself is in a “dance,” which keeps productivity from getting out of hand. It cycles 🔄 periods of growth, periods of quiescence. It’s all the cycles Solomon discusses early in chapter 3 of Ecclesiastes.
The nature of mankind is that we are in a constant “dance” with Creation, we striving for Eden on our own terms. We want the food when we want it, we want the temperature to be “just right,” we want the lighting to be “just right,” we want everything under our control. We don’t want illness••• we want to prolong life until we become immortal. The nature of Creation is such that when we find an antibiotic to conquer bacteria, the bacteria will become resistant (mostly because we overuse it – we don’t know when to say “enough”). If we, like Noah, become a man of the ground and plant a vineyard, it’s not long until we become drunk and our nakedness is uncovered. (Genesis 9:18-29) Our nakedness is our weakness – our inability to say “enough” to our desires. It is the “dance” within our very souls. (More on Noah in a bit.) And recall אסף in Genesis 8:20-22 above. See the highlighted words. He (per his Creation) “adds,” striking the cycles in living things, weather, resistant bacteria••• we fight and Creation responds.
- This is a long entry – if you need to take a break, this is a “division point.”
There is SO much more to be said – and whether you are male or female, the battle within goes on every day. If you do not agree with this statement, you are either dead or dead to your self/fooling your self.
God knows us. He chose to make an ongoing, permanent part of Creation the “dance,” the restraining and expressing of “striving,” which is seen everywhere. I touched briefly on how we tend to relate to life on this earth with “the dance,” above, expressed in our desire to control our environment. And there is much more to that, but I would like to really focus on the dance within us, the spiritual battle that is waged within our soul.
We spoke last time about the division of who we are as human beings, into three parts, body, soul, and spirit. And we mentioned that the spirit is not directly connected to the body, but only through the soul. We were taught that the Spirit of the LORD connects with our own spirit to have an influence upon us. (See that “the Spirit of the LORD appears some 37 times in the Hebrew writings.)
(((A very brief but colorful side-journey here; apologies:
The LORD’s voice is there, his spirit is there, and his presence is there. And if you look at the golden color as “soul נפש” surrogates, our soul hears but chooses to hide, and we have drawn parallels between trees/forest and words – our souls choose to hide in the midst of the words. Interesting. 🤔)))
The Spirit of the LORD is able to work mighty wonders and is able to do that by connecting with our own personal spirit, but even so, the dance, the battleground, the “give and take,” takes place within our soul. If our soul chooses to hide from his spirit, he respects that in the name of “free will,” to our great loss. It is in the soul where our conscious and subconscious mind function; it is the residence of our emotions; it is the location of our “will,” which includes self-discipline or lack thereof, the so-called “restraint/expression, physical/emotional” of the את cognate permutations group (which includes time עת – and thus our struggle with patience).
The LORD has built limitations into Creation for our protection, to help things from getting out of control, BUT he has left us with “free will,” which supposedly separates us from the angels. The battleground, the dance, is within us, and specifically within that “soul” part of us. The teaching of Scripture is to help us with learning to manage our “free will” in such a way as to follow the two great commandments,
- Luke 10:27
- 27 So he answered and said, ”‘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.’” (From Deuteronomy 6:5 and. Leviticus 19:18.)
So, how can I make such broad statements? We can only begin to scratch the surface here. There are several Hebrew words that are translated as “will,” one of the most common (always depending on different English translations) is חפץ, mentioned above as a cognate permutation of אסף:
- One of the most recognizable verses is this:
Yeshayahu 53:10 (Mikraot Gedolot)
וַי״י חָפֵץ דַּכְּאוֹ הֶחֱלִי אִם תָּשִׂים אָשָׁם נַפְשׁוֹ יִרְאֶה זֶרַע יַאֲרִיךְ יָמִים וְחֵפֶץ י״י בְּיָדוֹ יִצְלָח.
⦁ Isaiah 53:10
Isaiah 53:10
10 Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him;
he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.
- Two other important occurrences of “the will” as pertains to the LORD, BUT חפץis also used of man’s will:
⦁ Psalms 135:6-7
6 Whatever the LORD wills, he does,
in heaven and on earth,
in the seas and all deeps.
7 He it is who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth,
who makes lightnings for the rain
and brings forth the wind from his storehouses.
⦁ Proverbs 21:1-2
1 The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD;
he turns it wherever he wills.
2 Every way of a man is right in his own eyes,
but the LORD weighs the heart.
- The will חפץ of man איש:
⦁ Deuteronomy 25:7
7 And if the man does not wish to take his brother’s wife, then his brother’s wife shall go up to the gate to the elders and say, ‘My husband’s brother refuses to perpetuate his brother’s name in Israel; he will not perform the duty of a husband’s brother to me.’
⦁ Psalms 34:11-14
11 Come, children, listen to me;
I will teach you the fear of the LORD.
12 What man is there who desires life
and loves many days, that he may see good?
13 Keep your tongue from evil
and your lips from speaking deceit.
14 Turn away from evil and do good;
seek peace and pursue it.
(This would be the blood-sweating prayer in Gethsemane – “not my will, but yours.”)
- See below that this is part of Creation from the very beginning. The word עשב for “herb” is a cognate permutation. All of these things, the fruit of the tree, the herb, the animal of the earth, the bird of the air, could be help us to learn to exercise our will. [[The cognate permutation meaning for the אסף/חפץ group is (direct/guide).]]
- See (just above) that cognate permutations for חפץ include some important words for us to ponder, including the training of those leaving Egypt, their “classroom” being the wilderness.
- And see below the connection in the Genesis 1 passage above to זרע, which is translated in ESV 135 times as offspring, 10 times as descendants. Here it is “sowing” and “seed.” This is the “circle of life,” כל את, the “dance,” how we learn in this life to “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.’” We teach our offspring, and our offspring teach us. And that learning is deep, deep within the soul.
- See the “doublet,” בש:
בש cognate permutations (influence; have impact)
- Includes words like חפץ “will” and נפש “soul” seen above, as well “ashamed,” בושas in Genesis 2:25, “the man and his wife were both naked and not ashamed.”
We appear to be driven by some parts of our soul. Other parts, perhaps we have not exercised sufficiently. But, there must be that balance of all the parts of our soul, the conscious and unconscious “minds,” our emotions and our will. (A friend of mine uses the word “ego.”) The best balance comes when we allow the Spirit of the LORD to connect with our spirit and “guide/direct” us.
את/עד cognate permutations (restrain/express emotion)
+
גל/כל/לך cognate permutations (measure of striving/cycle)
But, in my old age, I begin to see in some ways as did Solomon/Shlomo. I would like for you to ponder how this all relates to the topic of “enough” that we brought forth. How we live our lives with “restraint, enough” (or not) has an impact on those around us, including our offspring, but also on a wide world. In my life I have been very evil at times. And in my life I have attempted to be too good. Indulge me through this next section; and take another break if you need it. A friend from work does art. This was a requested piece:
There is one more large piece of the “enough” picture. The theme runs throughout Scripture and is often discussed in the topic of idols. Hubris, thinking too highly of ourselves. Webster defines hubris as “exaggerated pride or self-confidence.” This (in my perspective – accept or reject) is where we find ourselves in America today.
This is why Moses/Moshe was not able to enter the promised land with the people.
But there is a lesson, that I see, in the life of Noah that we must address: in Gn6:9, he is called תמים. You may have heard many interpretations of what happened when Noah became a man of the ground and was exposed in his tent (recall long ago we spoke of “tent” as “influence”). I’ll give you another perspective.
Remember the discussions of דם and דמים in Blog 123 and Blog 124. We shared דם as “measure,” and דמים as “excesses.” See a cognate of דמים in תמים“perfect; complete.” Perfect; complete is good for the LORD, but is an excess for man.
- The fall of Noah was, as he was תמים (perfect/blameless – Genesis 6:9) “in his generation.” He compared himself to all others around him and the hubris took over. But it is not long until he cannot maintain that “image” of being “too good.” His nature, his character comes out in a state of drunkenness, he is “exposed,” and it is recognized by Ham. He is not as perfect as he thinks himself to be. And the curses follow. It is when we strive to be “too Godlike” in relation to “our generation” that we cross over to hubris.
- Let me quote the action that leads to Moses’s not crossing the Jordan (crossing “the descender,” to humility).
Numbers 20:10-12 NKJV
10 And Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock; and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring water for you out of this rock?” 11 Then Moses lifted his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod; and water came out abundantly, and the congregation and their animals drank.
12 Then the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe Me, to hallow Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”
- Here, Moses exalts himself and calls all “the generation” of those he was leading “you rebels.” He compares himself to others and makes himself a god, rather than directing others toward the LORD.
“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.’” Don’t try to “be” God – love God and let him work through you. It is the second part, loving our neighbor as ourselves that brings the moderation to our striving. Another piece of art from my co-worker, and we’ll move on:
- The message I hear in that statement is “be good, but not ‘too good;’ make sure you smell the roses.”
- Going to that Genesis 6:9 passage where Noah was “perfect in his generations,” I want to introduce a recurring Hebrew word/witness there, שחת:
Please notice we have been looking at a lot of words including the doublet אש fire/עץ tree/עז goat cognate permutations, the meaning (strength/concentrate energy). Here is שחת/תשע again:
Notice the vocabulary word in bold here, “nine” תשע. It is a cognate permutation of חסד(which, again includes the אש doublet). See it in the list below, תשע p.289 decrease. It is said to be “decrease” in the sense of taking away one from one of the numbers of completion, ten עשׂר. I have not yet delved into Gematria, the study of the Hebrew numbers. But I can share that nine seems to fit the pattern we are discussing here, of Noah at “perfection in his generations,” and that things declined/decreased from there. ((Two of the cognate permutations for ten עשׂר are ראש p.237 begin; animate (head) and אשר p.18 progress; move forward.)) God’s mercy/kindness for us is in the cycles of increasing and decreasing, expressing and restraining the measure of striving. Here, שחת/תשע in the “cycles” passage:
Those who are familiar with Hebrew at all know the word חסד, “chesed,” which is translated in many ways in English: “mercy, kindness, lovingkindness, goodness, kindly, favor,” etc. Strongs says it occurs 248 times:
- One of the better-known passages with חסד:
⦁ Micah 6:6-8 NKJV
6 With what shall I come before the LORD,
And bow myself before the High God?
Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings,
With calves a year old?
7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams,
Ten thousand rivers of oil?
Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression,
The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
8 He has shown you, O man, what is good;
And what does the LORD require of you
But to do justly,
To love mercy (h2617. חֶסֶד ḥeseḏ),
And to walk humbly with your God?
Here, that passage with “soul נפש:”
- The prophet does a good job of clarifying earlier writings. It is in our soul that the battle is waged, the dance takes place. We pit our will against our emotions, all the while pondering both in our mind. It is no wonder that we should need to connect our spirit רוח with the Spirit of the LORD and allow her to guide. (Mentioned long ago רוח can be either masculine or feminine, but is most often feminine in linguistic terms.)
- I know of only one direct witness that tells us that God himself has a “soul.” The remainder would be indirect evidence.
⦁ Psalms 11:5 NKJV
5 The LORD tests the righteous,
But the wicked and the one who loves violence His soul hates.
- The indirect evidence is that we are told he loves and he hates and he is jealous, all being emotions that would reside in a “soul.” If indeed the LORD has a soul, we should be able to discern aspects of it in the passage about his attributes:
⦁ Exodus 34:6-7 NKJV
6 And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, 7 keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.”
The “plan” at the beginning was a three-to-four part Dance Series,” We have completed number four. In this final one we’ve covered many aspects. I’m sure you could find much more on the body/soul/spirit connections and more depth on all those occurrences of adjacent את כל. Thank you Koholet. And, as always, we are thankful, LORD, for your Word. I do have some thoughts about future discussion of חסד.
A brief word of thanks to my children and grandchildren for reminders not to take myself too seriously – a needed reminder.
We are all connected. As the Lakota say, “Mitakuye Oyasin.”
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