True Repentance
For if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you truly practice justice between a man and his neighbor, if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, nor walk after other gods to your own ruin, then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever. Jeremiah 7:5-7 NASB
Amend – Make some minor changes! Modify your behavior! Put things right! Is that what “amend” means? The Hebrew verb is yāṭab. Its basic meaning is “be good, be well, be glad, be pleasing.”[1] That doesn’t sound much like “make a few minor changes.” Paul Gilchrist writes:
“Aside from the usages in which yāṭab refers to God’s beneficent attitude and dealings with his people, the verb seems to refer to beneficence in general whether or not it is associated with fidelity and righteousness of character.”[2] But the translation doesn’t capture the extensive nature of this verb. God’s beneficence isn’t a minor change in creation. It’s the foundation of all life! When the prophet tells us to “truly amend,” he isn’t asking you to change the color of your dress or drive a different route to work. He’s asking you to sell everything and move to another country. He’s asking for radical change, not incidental alterations. Did you notice that the verb is applied to “your ways and your deeds”? This is whole-hearted transformation. Attitude, thought, and action are all involved. In fact, the shift is so important that the prophet has to delineate precisely what it means, as we shall see. The bottom line is this: yāṭab finds its home in God’s arena, and if we are going to use this verb to describe us, we better end up doing what God does. As Heschel notes: “. . . the true meaning of the religion of sympathy—to feel the divine pathos as one feels one’s own state of the soul.”[3]
Jeremiah calls the people to repentance. They are to give up their current ways and deeds. But that isn’t enough. True repentance includes new actions. Those actions are the practice of justice between men, the nurture of the oppressed, the sanctity of life and the refusal to enter into agreement with any other god. Repentance isn’t regret and remorse. Yes, those are steps along the path, but real repentance means a change in outward behavior, not just a renewed inner spirituality. Yeshua says the same thing when he tells us to leave the offering at the altar and attend to reconciliation with a brother before coming to God. Yes, you can weep and beg, but when you get off your knees your treatment of neighbors and needy better be different.
A verse from Jeremiah provides another motive. “Now then thus says the Lord God of hosts, the God of Israel, ‘Why are you doing great harm to yourselves, . . .’” (Jeremiah 44:7a). The result of true repentance isn’t just a change in communal behavior. It’s also personally beneficial. What’s good for God is also good for you. What more could you ask?
Topical Index: amend, yāṭab, repentance, behavior, motivation, Jeremiah 7:5-7
[1] Gilchrist, P. R. (1999). 863 יָטַב. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 375). Chicago: Moody Press.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Abraham Heschel, The Prophets: Two Volumes in One (Hendrickson Publishers, 1962), Vol. 2, p. 99.
