An Incomplete Life

Now Jacob came safely to the city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Paddan-aram, and camped before the city.  Genesis 33:18  NASB

Safely – In Hebrew there are really only two verb tenses; complete actions and incomplete actions. That’s because Hebrew sees the world with a completely different framework than Indo-European languages.  It sees the world in terms of actions rather than time.  Our Indo-European languages offer many more shades of meaning in verbs. We have past, present, and future, of course, but we also have those odd things like pluperfect, subjunctive, and imperfect.  Greek has even more. But not in Hebrew.  In Hebrew, actions are either finished or they are not finished.  Hebrew verb tenses like Hiphil, Qal and Niphal really don’t match up with our ideas of verbs.  This is one of the principal and radical differences between thinking in Hebrew and thinking in Greek (or some other European-based language).

Now you might say, “Oh, that’s an interesting detail, but does it really matter much?” After all, when you read the Bible it still seems to have past, present, and future verbs.  Of course, these are translations into our language.  They don’t quite fit what it actually says in Hebrew because there really isn’t an identical match.  But the translation issue isn’t the biggest change.  The biggest change is what a complete/incomplete view of the world means for who we are and how we live.

When we examined the translation “safely” for the Hebrew word shalom (see July 7), we discovered that this verse is really about the completion of Jacob, not his security.  He arrives back at Canaan a different person, a finished (to this point) person who no longer needs to be Esau in order to feel accepted.  The story isn’t about his faults.  It’s about the process of Jacob becoming human.

I have often described the Hebraic view of human being as “becoming human.”  God initiates the process in Genesis. He forms us into relational free-will agents.  But that is only the beginning of being human.  Being human is formed in us by the history of our choices over the course of our lifetime. In other words, when we choose to obey God’s instructions, we become more like Him.  Our actions produce resemblance and this resemblance produces transparency with God until, finally, we are conformed to His “image.” What is that image?  Well, it’s not some kind of space-time substance, as Greek philosophy would imply.  If we read Exodus 34:6-7, God tells us what His image is—and all the descriptions are verbs, not nouns.  God is what He does.  Even His name is a verb.  So how do you and I become human?  By being breathed into existence?  No, I don’t think so.  We become human by doing what God does. In other words, we are an incomplete action until we arrive at the Judgment Seat.  We are either human or not human (completed action) at the end, not the beginning.

The same view holds true for the idea of marriage.  I might be legally and contractually connected when I say vows in the ceremony, but that view of marriage as a completed state does not seem to have much traction in the Hebraic world.  In Hebrew, I become married, just as I become human, by the choices I make over a long period of time.  Love has little to do with it.  Marriage is davaq– sticking together in covenant relationship no matter what.  The paradigm verse on marriage (Genesis 2:24) doesn’t include a single word about love.  How do I know if I am married (did you notice the past tense in that question?)?  I look back over the course of my life with my spouse and see if my choices have engendered unity.  My goal is to become one(“and the two shall become one”) so I should be able to see this conjoining over time.  Marriage today is the incomplete action of moving toward perfect harmony and unity.  That’s why marriage is the metaphor for YHVH’s relationship with His people. It is incomplete now but moving toward completion when He returns. If my marriage isn’t moving toward unity, then it isn’t marriage from an Hebraic perspective.

These two examples lead me to consider the implications for one more serious matter of faith—repentance.  To repent (in Hebrew, “to return, to turn around” – shuv) does not mean to make a confession, to regret, to plead for forgiveness or the like.  Yes, those are perhaps the first steps in repenting and they are needed.  But they are like signing the marriage license.  They are only the initial part of the actions of becoming repentant.  What then is repenting?  It is living from some point onward so that the behaviors I have confessed are no longer part of my life.  In other words, repentance is an incomplete action until my life exhibits a complete change in direction. In biblical terms, this is called “bringing forth the fruits of repentance.”  Repentance is only complete when I no longer do the things I used to do.  For followers of YHVH, repentance is becoming conformed to His Torah, little by little, one day at a time.  So today I can say, “I am repentant about such-and-such” because that behavior is not part of my life today.

This has an immediate implication for the concept of obedience.  “To have Torah written on the heart is to have one’s life regulated and marked by its precepts,” says Tim Hegg.[1]  Torah obedience is also an incomplete action because it requires continuous adjustment of life to the Torah standard over time.  At the end of the process, our hearts will have been conditioned by our choices so that Torah describes what we have become and we will be able to say, “I have conformed my life to Torah.”  Repentance is becoming Torah observant. Certainly this is the view of John the Baptist (“bring forth fruits in concert with repentance”) and Paul (“conformed to the image of His Son”) and Yeshua Himself (“not one part of the Torah or the smallest part of a Torah letter will disappear until heaven and earth pass away”).

Hebrew is a world of becoming.  Even the ‘olam ha’ba is becoming.  It approaches as we bring about righteousness in the world.  We are becoming human because we are becoming repentant as we become observant.  We are truly “works in progress.”  With this shift in mind, you and I can look back over our lives and ask, “Does my past demonstrate that I am becoming a new creature resembling the character of YHVH?”  If you discover that your history travels over the same ground again and again, you might want to consider very carefully the journey of the Israelites in the wilderness. Forty years going over the same ground because they refused to become the people God elected them to be.

“It is by one’s actions that the true nature of the heart is revealed.”[2]In Hebrew it is not possible to have faith in your “heart” but not in your hands and feet.

Topical Index:  becoming, safely, complete, shalom, Genesis 33:18

[1]Tim Hegg,The Letter Writer, 2^ndEdition (Torah Resource, Tacoma, WA., 2002), p. 219.

[2]Ibid., p. 220.