Manifest Destiny

Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name.  Matthew 6:9 NASB

Hallowed – Recently we looked at this verse through the scholarship of Ernst Lohmeyer.  We discovered that “hallowed” meant changing God’s hiddenness into observable glory.  “Hallowed be Your name” really means doing all we can to reveal God in this world.  Whether that action is individual or communal, its purpose is to make God visible, to show that He is the Lord of human history.  But Lohmeyer adds another level.  Hallowing God’s name means sanctifying who God is.  “The process of sanctification also leads beyond itself, for its ultimate end is not the sanctification of the world through God, but the sanctification of God through the world.  Even the world and mankind are only elements in the process of sanctification in which God sanctifies himself.”[1]

For those of us with a theological ear, this sounds a little strange.  Isn’t “sanctification” about “the action or process of being freed from sin or purified”?  Aren’t we taught that following conversion we are to become “sanctified” by removing all those things that once caused us to sin?  If this is true, then how can God be sanctified?  It would seem that sanctification is a process exclusively for those who were once sinners.  But we are mistaken.  While theological doctrines might treat sanctification as a process of becoming pure, the root of the idea is found in the Greek term hágios and in the Hebrew qōdeš. 

The old Greek term hágos denotes an object of awe, the adjective hagḗs means “clean,” and the verb házō has the sense “to shrink from.” hágios is used of sanctuaries (“sacred”) and later of gods and religious practices, though it becomes common only in the Hellenistic period.^[2]

The Greek Matthew suggests that God is hagiázō (made sanctified) when His awe overpowers the world, that is, when His true glory and majesty is revealed in all of His creation.  “Hallowed be Your name” literally means sanctifying God; making Him overwhelmingly apparent.

This is based on the Hebrew idea of qōdeš. 

Originally Canaanitic, the root qds has a basic cultic reference. The ground around the burning bush is holy (Ex. 3:5), as are Gilgal (Josh. 5:15), the temple (Is. 64:10), days (Is. 58:13), offerings (1 Sam. 21:5–7), and tithes (Dt. 26:13). The adjective may be applied to persons and even to God; this produces an ethical association. The verb is versatile, denoting the expressing of a state of holiness (Is. 5:16), or setting in a state of holiness (Ezek. 36:23), or declaring holy (Ex. 19:10), or entering a state of holiness (Josh. 3:5), or being dedicated^[3]

The word comes to be connected with God’s name, which is the expression of his nature, and thus takes on a moral meaning (cf. Am. 4:2)^[4]

God’s holiness expresses his divine perfection. His self-revelation is his self-sanctification (Lev. 10:3 etc.)^[5]

Qōdeš, then, means “consecrated, a state of holiness, dedicated, devoted, belonging to the sacred.”  “But the biblical viewpoint would refer the holiness of God not only to the mystery of his power, but also to his character as totally good and entirely without evil.^[6]  Anything and everything that magnifies the creation in its original sense (“And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good”), magnifies the Creator, and in the end, this is the ultimate purpose of all creation—to sanctify God.  To hallow God’s name is to live in such a way that His glory, His power, His awesomeness becomes evident.  That is effectively what it means for His kingdom to come on earth.  And that is our objective.  What we do that magnifies God is hallowing.  What we do that does not magnify God is sin.  Just so, when the entire creation acts according to God’s character, He is sanctified by the creation itself.  We are left only to do our part.

Topical Index: hallow, sanctify, holy, hágos, qōdeš, Matthew 6:9

[1] Ernst Lohmeyer, Our Father: An Introduction to the Lord’s Prayer (Harper & Row, 1965), p. 73.

^[2] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (pp. 14–15). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

^[3] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (p. 15). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

^[4] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (p. 15). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

^[5] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (p. 15). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

^[6] Mccomiskey, T. E. (1999). 1990 קָדַשׁ. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 787). Chicago: Moody Press.