Living Up to Your Reputation
(Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.) Numbers 12:3 NIV
Very humble– How can a man be the most humble man on the face of the earth? Just knowing that he is would create some small twinge of pride, wouldn’t it? It would make him unique, set him apart, and in that very moment, he would stop being the most humble man. It’s like looking in the mirror and telling yourself that you are humble. The person reflected back to you suddenly suggests that your statement makes you special—and humility flies out the window.
As if that weren’t enough, Moses doesn’t live up to his reputation. He gets angry with the people. He complains to God about his mission and responsibilities. He strikes out against those who don’t trust him. He acts like someone who expects instant obedience—not exactly what we think of as humility. So what’s going on here? What does the text mean when it says he was very humble?
Perhaps our English word isn’t the proper one. We think of “humble, as “having or showing a modest or low estimate of one’s own importance.” But Moses isn’t really like this, is he? When he stands before Pharaoh, he isn’t acting like a man who thinks he is of no importance. When he leads the people in the wilderness, providing God’s miracles for them, listening to their complaints and determining the proper course of action, he isn’t acting like a man who personal character is self-deprecating. When he is challenged by Miriam or Koresh, does he act submissively? Clearly not. We’ve got the wrong idea here.
The Hebrew verse doesn’t actually contain the word “very.” That’s implied, perhaps, by the rest of the sentence. What’s most important is the actual word used here—ʿānāw. You see, it doesn’t have to mean “humble.” The root is ʿānâ, meaning, “afflict, oppressed, humble.” Notice the meaning of the verbal root. “The primary meaning of ʿānâ III is ‘to force,’ or ‘to try to force submission,’ and ‘to punish or inflict pain upon,’ mostly in the Piel.”[1]
“The verb is used in several ways. It is used of what one does to his enemy. It describes the discomfort Sarah inflicted upon Hagar (Gen 16:6) and what the lawless do to the defenseless (Ex 22:22 [H 21]). It speaks of the pain inflicted on Joseph’s ankles by the fetters (Ps 105:18). It sets forth what Egypt did to Israel (Ex 1:11–12: this was more than slavery). In Num 24:24 and Judges it describes the physical pain brought by war. It is used for what God does to his enemies (Deut 26:6). . . . Another theological theme frequently connected with this word is self-inflicted inner pain expressing contrition and often accompanied by fasting.”[2]
Notice Coppes’ description of the adjective: “This adjective stresses the moral and spiritual condition of the godly as the goal of affliction implying that this state is joined with a suffering life rather than with one of worldly happiness and abundance.”[3]
Now we see why the word is attributed to Moses. He is a man who suffers and is afflicted by a connection to God. His relationship costs him! He is dismissed, doubted, rejected, disobeyed, castigated, ignored, challenged, and abused. Sometimes he believes these actions are perpetrated by the people, and sometimes by God. “Moses’ description of himself (Num 12:3) as such a man is no proud boast, but merely a report of his position: absolute dependence on God.”[4] And he pays for it!
Humble? No, not quite. More like afflicted. More afflicted than any man on the face of the earth. Until . . . another comes along.
Topical Index: ʿānāw, humble, afflicted, Numbers 12:3
A TECHNICAL NOTE: Some of you have experienced problems on the web site because Today’s Word was not updating properly. Thanks for letting me know. Mark (bless him) has fixed it.
[1]Coppes, L. J. (1999). 1652 עָנָה. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 682). Chicago: Moody Press.
I have created a closed (private) group on the MeWe social media platform. It is meant for the continuation of comments and discussions as we have had in the past on this website. I do not have the names and email addresses of our members, and I would like to make the group available to any of the members here who would like to join.
The name of the group is “Today’s Word Discussion Group,” and the web address is:
https://mewe.com/group/5d55fbd1b9de9e48c5571d69
Thank you, Gail! I am hoping a whole lot of women (and men) take you up on this (and write, too). I LOVE hearing from everybody, but feel that folks can get shy on this space sometimes.
P.S. Gail, I can’t figure out how to use this! Please instruct!
Thank you, Gayle. I have been struggling to set up up something like this but I have a difficult time understanding this social media stuff. Hopefully, I can figure the MeWe app out and see you there.
To join, go to mewe dot com, and sign up as a member on that site. When you have done so, then click on the “group” icon (four circles on the upper left side of the page), and type “Today’s Word Discussion Group” in the search bar. It should bring you to the page for our group. If not, please let me know. Once you have joined Today’s Word Discussion Group, you only have to click on the group name.
For those who are not on social media sites, it will not be necessary to engage in other areas, but this is like a building, where “joining” is just getting through the door. Our group is a room down the hall, and we do not have to go into the other rooms. I hope this analogy makes sense.
Well, that was excellent instruction, I am signed in, but when I search TWDG I get thrown into a group called “anarchy”. Help!
That’s the group that came up for me, too, when I first tried. It seems to be there now. Why don’t you try again.
I am logged in to the MeWe site but it doesn’t find the “Today’s Word Discussion Group” when I search for it.
Ric (and anyone else here), the simplest way to become a member is to be one of my contacts, or a contact of another member. If you would like to do that, here is my link, and I can then add you to the group.
mewe.com/i/gaylejohnson
Gayle, thank you for doing this. I just signed up, but still am not sure how to navigate. I used this link and added you as contact. My name is Kay Ang. Thanks again!
Gayle,
nothing I’ve tried works, including your personal link.
Any newer insight?
I see that we need five members for the group to show up as “searchable.” This link may also work:
https://mewe.com/join/todaysworddiscussiongroup
Thanks. One Me is now 8 We.( if you accept my application!) Looking forward. Thanks Gayle for taking this on.
Hey that is cool Gayle. Penny and I dont do social media for many reasons but this looks like a nice blend between the alternatives. Thanks a lot.
Thanks Gail. I’m in.
I think I have applied correctly. Hope to be in soon! thanks for setting this up.
I have signed up and am awaiting a confirmation email but it is not coming through. Please research this delay.
I got the email and I seem to be okay. Thanks!
A venture such as this will need all types of people in order to thrive. May YHWH send us writers and readers, lookers and lurkers, lovers and leavers, weepers and sleepers, Quakers and movers, Shakers and makers, givers and takers, Muellers and mullers, as well as thinkers and thankers. Gift us with the serious and curious; the broken and breaking, both brokers and breakers, givers and takers. Don’t forget to add some grammarians and just a few contrarians. Let us welcome both heretics and heros, skeptics and peptics, liberals and librarians. Bless us with the converted and convertable, the poets and know-its, the soulful and playful and especially The Perfect. Bestow us Believers and retrivers, the rashful and bashful, with a splattering of dissenters and plenty of mentors. Grant us some menders among these members, those who ramble when they gamble, some verbose and a few verboten; send us sweepers and keepers among the sleepers. And if there be scholars, please let them not HOLLER. YHWH give us mourners, not scorners; the frankful, not frightful; those who are graceful and loving, not grudgeful and peeving.
YHWH, teach us all to be Truth-seekers and Torah-keepers. Bless this venture and the adventuresome.
Moses bore the burdens of the people, like what Paul instructs us to do. Have you ever done that? It’s hard! The instant people feel the weight shift, they dump it all on! They pick up their feet the minute you take their hand like a little kid and go “whee!”. All the afflictions their sins or the sins of those in their lives have generated: you get that, too. All their doubts: you suffer the consequences of. All their trauma PTSD? They want to make you responsible for that, too. Worst of all, because they get relief by you taking their hit, they don’t think they have to change: they just have be a bigger bully. (Whoops! I just described a dependent and their co-dependent. Sorry.)
Ok, lets start over, here. I think I have realized that, to the extent that I am not “absolutely depend(ing) on God” I am co-depending (leaning on, or, crooked as in not standing up straight in my sovereignty), too. In those places, because I have already substituted that dependence with things (um, self, usually) not of God, I (naturally) do that with others. In the name of love, I INVITE others to share my dependence upon ______ (whatever I am depending on: usually myself, of course). Now THAT’S some weight! Try loving somebody (which means meeting their needs, of course). You are going to use whatever your needs are currently being (well, kinda) met with. If those needs are being met with your own resources because you are not relying on God in that place, then you will find that you are going to use those same resources to meet the needs of those around you. The flesh, anyway, is going to go bankrupt in a hurry when it tries to really love!
True humility is about acceptance of reality: the way things really are. It is facing the facts; including the facts of the true needs of ourselves and all around us. Because I come from Appalachia, however, I also still know the term “being humbled” (afflicted). It means taking the hit: the full force: of need in that place; whether it is yours or another’s. This is why I think we run from the needs of others as well as ourselves: we don’t want to take that hit! But if we did, we would quickly realize that the weight is too heavy for a reason: we were never expected to carry it in the first place. It’s a real come-to-Jesus place. Time to hand it over.
Moses had to depend on God to not only meet his needs, but also the needs of all the others he had signed on to being responsible for. He was loving a whole lot of folks! He had to trust God to take care of them in all the places they didn’t know how to trust Him (yet) themselves. He felt the weight of their needs and problems (because that is what you feel when you care about others ) but it makes all the difference in the world as to what you do with that weight! Moses knew better than to take it on himself: I think the rock incident was where he momentarily forgot (pride) that he couldn’t carry such a load.
I was afraid of God. I was afraid of His afflictions (corrections). I ran, but I still tried to love, too. I was bankrupt the whole time. In the process, I picked up the afflictions of others (because I was trying to love them, of course), as well as suffering the fallout of my own poor choices, too. Heavy load. I ended up eating the husks left over after the unclean, ungodly had eaten all they wanted. I finally decided that God’s afflictions couldn’t be any worse. So now I try to ask Him to correct me first, as well as to meet my needs. It’s going better. Now the loads that others carry I not only have better resources to help with, I do the same thing with those loads that I do with mine: I turn around (well, getting there!) and immediately (sometimes!) dump them on my Big Brother. These days, I don’t seem to be so attractive to folks who just want another human being to share the misery with. Those around me (hopefully) are starting to know that if I share the weight (of their true needs), the channel gets opened to a corrective Source, and it’s change time. And I didn’t have to do any of it – just hold the door open! Halleluah!