How Long?

He will not always strive with us, nor will He keep His anger forever. Psalm 103:9 NASB

Keep – How long will God stay angry? Answering that question seems to be behind the usual translations of this verse. For example, TEV renders the verse, “He does not keep on rebuking; he is not angry forever.” NIV: “nor will he harbor his anger forever.” ISV: “remain angry for all time.” The verb, natar, “to keep anger,” is used only here in this verse. That presents some translation problems. Lexicons turn to related and parallel occurrences in order to determine the meaning.[1]

But these translations raise an interesting question. Is David’s comment to be taken as a statement of enduring love or as a warning that the time for reconciliation will someday end? Here the insertion of a prepositional phrase makes a huge difference. The NASB inserts “with us” in this verse. The Hebrew simply reads, “He will not always strive (chide).” The object of God’s action is clear enough. We are the objects of His attention. But the mode of this action is not specified. Should the action be understood as striving with us or for us? Without the preposition, the verb is ambiguous. Thus, most translations do not attempt to specify the mode of God’s action. Left unspecified, these translations assume that God’s striving is a positive action, that is, God will cease chiding us because His love overcomes His discipline. The translators of the NASB took a different view. God’s striving is the positive event. His cessation is calamity.

Which is it? Hard to tell. The previous verse seems to favor the positive view. It extols God’s mercy and grace, deliberately leaving out the next thought of judgment. But perhaps David leaves out that sequence because everyone knows what comes next, and this verse amplifies the urgency of repentance. The judgment is not put off forever.

“He will not always chide,” as we discovered, uses a term most at home in combat. It seems to me that the implication is that chiding is what we expect from our encounters with YHVH. This is the action of a loving parent, prodding His children to live up to the destiny of their calling. If we read the verse as a positive statement (that God will cease contending with us), then the verse must imply that He is fighting now but will someday stop, that He is angry now but will someday be appeased. Does this fit the context of the psalm? Is David describing YHVH as angry and contentious now, with the hope that someday His displeasure will be lifted?

Consider the opening of this psalm. “Bless YHVH all that is within me.” Does this sound like a man who is trying to appease an angry God? “Who redeems,” “who pardons,” “who crowns you with hesed.” Is this a God whose temper burns? It seems to me that David has deliberately overlooked Exodus 34:7 in order to impress upon us that urgency of renewal. Now YHVH is ready to forgive, welcoming, able to restore, anxious to pardon. But not always. Exodus 34:7 will come to pass. His anger will arrive.

And while we are looking at natar we should not forget that “his anger” is also a gloss. The Hebrew simply reads, “nor will He keep forever.” What is it that He will not keep forever? Derivatives of the verb describe guards or targets. Nehemiah 1:2 and Jeremiah 3:5 suggest a connection with anger. Context must tell us how we are to understand this solitary verb in the psalm. Both Nehemiah and Jeremiah came long after David so while they may have borrowed the word from the Psalms, it is quite certain David did not borrow the word from the prophets.

So which is it? Which Bible captures David’s intention? And can we really know?

Topical Index: keep, natar, anger, Psalm 103:9

[1] For example, “The Lord “keeps wrath for his enemies” (Nah 1:2), yet he promises not to keep anger forever (Ps 103:9; Jer 3:5, 12; cf. Amos 1:11). In Lev 19:18, a verse which Jesus considered to be at the heart of the ot law (cf. Mt 19:19; Mk 12:31), Israel is commanded, “You shall not … bear any grudge (nāṭar) toward the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Wilson, M. R., TWOT #1356 נָטַר.

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Michael C

“nor will He keep His anger forever.”

I am always wanting to frame this within my lifetime as if it is addressed and referenced to only my generation. Over the horizon understanding of forever can mean a long, long time or not necessarily. Only YHVH can span generations after generations. I am but a puff in the wind, here one moment and gone the next.

Is it ambiguous to make me think his anger is possibly right around the corner when it most likely will be generations to come and thus prompt and nudge and push me today to action of taming the yetzer ha’ra?

Sometimes that which my parents frightened me (disciplined) with was what might happen as opposed to a direct explanation. That look or tone they sometimes gave me, without words or specificity, spoke with the clearest visionsat times with looks and tones I understood and translated quite well and quickly.

This seems a reality check statement. Get right or else. A descriptive prognostication with a prescriptive promise of certainty. One day. Tomorrow, maybe, or the next day. Maybe the day after that.

Today? This days job is to get the yetzer ha’ra submitted to the tov.

Pam

When I first started to read this the very first verse that came to me was; Ge 6:3 And the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for he also is flesh; yet his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.”

Perhaps they are related?

Carl Roberts

•Animated Jars of Clay



~ then the LORD God formed the man [adam] of dust from the ground [adamah] and breathed into his nostrils the Breath of life, [nasham- gasp- inhale suddenly with the mouth open, out of pain or astonishment] and the man became a living creature ~ (Genesis 2.7)



Though now among the “living souls” or a “living creatures,” it was man only who received his life from “the breath of God.”



When He [Yeshua HaMashiach- Jesus, who is the Christ] had said these things, He breathed upon them and He said to them, “Receive The Spirit of Holiness.” [Sacred or Holy ‘Pneuma’ – breath, wind, spirit].

~

~ And the LORD [YHWH] said, My Spirit [Ruach-breath,wind,spirit] shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh.. ~ (Genesis 3.7)



•The Conflict



“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. “Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must be born again..’ [or born from Above] – the “Second birth.” 

 In Adam by our first birth, – in Christ, the Second Adam by our second birth.

If born once- we die twice — if born twice – we die once.


~ I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable ~

(1 Corinthians 15.50)


•I Came Upon a Child of God



~ children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God ~
(John 1.13)



~ Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is ~ (1 John 3.2)



•Growing Up 

~ But [by] speaking the truth in love, may [we] grow up into Him in all things, [into Him] who is the head, -even Christ.. [the Anointed] ~ (Ephesians 4.15)



~[For] In Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the LORD ~ (Ephesians 2.21)


laurita hayes

Carl, that’s just cool.

carl roberts

Written in Red

In His Own Words — I AM come that they might have life – and have it more abundantly! (John 10.10)

In His Own Words — “Come unto Me..” (Matthew 11.28-29)

In His Own Words — “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” (John 7.38)

In letters of crimson, God wrote His love
On the hillside so long, long ago;

For you and for me Jesus did die,
And Love’s greatest story was told.

I love you, I love you
That’s what Calvary said;

I love you, I love you,
I love you, written in red.

Down through the ages, God wrote His love
With the same hands that suffered and bled;

Giving “ALL” that He had to give,

A message so easily read.

I love you, I love you,
That’s what Calvary said;

I love you, I love you,
I love you.

Oh, precious is the flow, that makes me white as snow;
No other fount I know, nothing but the blood of Jesus.

I love you, I love you
That’s what Calvary said;

I love you, I love you,
I love you, written in Red.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HbuJv065ek