The Happiness Formula (2)

I will never forget Your precepts, for by them You have revived me.  Psalm 119:93  NASB

Revived – The Hebrew verb ḥāyâ has a wide range of meanings: “live, have life, remain alive, sustain life, live prosperously, live forever. Also be quickened, revive from sickness, discouragement, or even death.”^[1]  As if that weren’t enough, there are also a host of derivatives: חַי (ḥay) I, living.

חַי (ḥay) II, kinsfolk.

חַיָּה (ḥayyâ) I, living thing.

חַיָּה (ḥayyâ) II, community.

חַיֶה (ḥayeh) having the vigor of life, lively.

חַיִּים (ḥayyîm) life.

חַיּוּת (ḥayyût). Occurs in the phrase ʾalmānôt ḥayyût “widowhood of livingness,” i.e. grass widow, one who was separated from her husband.

מִחיָה (miḥyâ) preservation of life.^[2]

We shouldn’t be surprised.  The same breadth of meanings occurs with most of the “to be” verbs in human languages.  If you reflect on that fact for just a moment, it might strike you that human preoccupation with being—and with being alive—is not only widely applicable but also interestingly unusual.  Perhaps that helps explain why such verbs tend to be irregular in their conjugations.  At any rate, the psalmist adds one crucial thought to this cornucopia of copulas.  Life is intimately involved with remembering God’s piqqûdîm.  He expresses it negatively, i.e., “I will never forget.”  The verb is more than letting something slip from one’s mind.  šākaḥ is also the verb for ignoring.  In Hebrew thought, to remember is to do.  To forget is to fail to do.  Perhaps this is why the word for “male” is zākār, which is also the word for “remember.”  Apparently, the primary task of being a man is to remember God’s oversight, and not just to bring it to mind but to actually act upon it.  To do what is required.  Can we suggest, perhaps, that a homo sapien who either forgets or ignores God’s piqqûdîm fails to be truly human?  Certainly such a creature cannot be labeled zākār.

“I will never forget.”  Actually, how could he forget?  His very constitution is a testimony to God’s piqqûdîm.  Of course, the word translated “never” is actually ʿôlām, and as we noted before, this word covers the entire range of temporal sequence from the distant past to the extended future.  What is does not cover is timelessness.  That should also not be surprising.  Human existence is absolutely temporal.  There is no eternality about us.  In fact, the idea of an eternal “soul” isn’t biblical.  It was introduced into Western thought by the Greek philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras.  Human existence in biblical terms is always time-bound.  When the psalmist says he will never forget, he’s encompassing all temporal experience, and it is within this framework that he connects ḥāyâ with remembering.

That leads us to one other crucial idea about remembering.  It’s another line from the psalmist.  “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.  For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:13-14).  This verse is a godsend, literally.  Without it we are doomed.  God remembers just how weak, dependent, and mortal we are—and it is a joyous wonder that He does.  Life depends on His remembering.  Perhaps we should add a footnote to the poet’s verse.  “I will never forget”—and neither will God.

Topical Index: forget, šākaḥ, remember, zākār, piqqûdîm, ʿôlām, Psalm 103:13-14, Psalm 119:93

^[1] Smick, E. B. (1999). 644 חָיָה. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 279). Moody Press.

^[2] Ibid.