Max Headroom

I have seen a limit to all perfection; Your commandment is exceedingly broad.  Psalm 119:96  NASB

Perfection – What is the limit of all perfection?  When you think about it, the phrase is a bit strange.  If something is perfect it doesn’t have a limit.  If it did, would it still be perfect?  If I set a border for perfection, what is beyond that border?  Better perfection?  No perfection?  The whole idea is nonsensical.  And how could anyone—any human—“see,” even in the imagination, such a limit?  If I were to see this, wouldn’t that imply that my perspective is greater than perfection?  How could that be?  Theologians recognize these contradictions when they employ the via negativa to describe God.  According to Aquinas, God is perfect.  That is to say, He is a  being to which nothing can be added or taken away.  At the same  time, He is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent—all terms that defy the idea of limit.  But this is Greek thinking, not Hebrew.  How are we supposed to understand “the limit to all perfection” in Hebrew thought?

I’m sure you appreciate the difficulty, although I imagine you never actually considered how contradictory the statement really is.  You just assumed that the poet was speaking metaphorically about the lack of perfection in this world.  And, of course, you assumed that things will be “perfect” in the next world (although I’m not so sure we even understand that). The problem is caused by the translation (and a bit of Greek philosophy).  You see, the Hebrew is miklâ and it doesn’t mean “perfection.”  In fact, the idea of perfection really doesn’t appear in the Bible (although translations certainly incorporate it).  Instead, miklâ means “to bring a process to completion.”  That’s a long way from our usual Greek-based idea of perfect.  To complete something doesn’t require perfection at all, although we could think of the end result as the “perfect” finish of the process.  For example, if I cut a natural diamond into a “princess” shape, I could say that the finished product is perfect.  I don’t mean it has no flaws.  I mean that the end result is the stone cut into a certain shape.  Or I could say that his test score was perfect, and mean only that all the answers were correct.  If I translate this verse as “I have seen the limit to all completed things,” I have a correct Hebrew translation without involving myself in a struggle with the idea of perfection.

With this clarification in mind, the rest of the verse takes on a different sense.  Why does the psalmist draw opposition between miklâ and m^eod r^eḥābā (exceedingly broad)?  Because while all finished things come to completion, the miṣwâtis never finished—complete.  It continues as long as heaven and earth continue, and it is applicable in every circumstance of history.  Of the end there are no days.

Why does the psalmist make such a comparison?  At the completion of the lamedh section, he summarizes what we have learned.  We learn that God’s word—His commandments, His oversight, His involvement—never ceases.  It not only covers all creation, it also covers every moment from the distant past to the distant future.  Forgetting this jeopardizes our very existence.  And so we declare, “I love Your Law,” the first statement of the next section.

Topical Index: m^eod r^eḥābā, miklâ, perfection, completion, Psalm 119:96