Term Limits

Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Your Law is truth.  Psalm 119:142 NASB

Everlasting – How long is everlasting?  Wait, don’t give me a naïve answer, “Well, forever, of course.”  Think deeper. The word is ʿôlām.  Macrae makes the following remark about this Hebrew word:

Probably derived from ʿālam I, “to hide,” thus pointing to what is hidden in the distant future or in the distant past . . . Though ʿôlām is used more than three hundred times to indicate indefinite continuance into the very distant future, the meaning of the word is not confined to the future. There are at least twenty instances where it clearly refers to the past. Such usages generally point to something that seems long ago, but rarely if ever refer to a limitless past. . . None of these past references has in it the idea of endlessness or limitlessness, but each points to a time long before the immediate knowledge of those living. . . ʿōlām can express by itself the whole range of meanings denoted by all the prepositions “since, until, to the most distant time”; i.e. it assumes the meaning “(unlimited, incalculable) continuance, eternity. . . The LXX generally translates ʿōlām by aiōn which has essentially the same range of meaning. That neither the Hebrew nor the Greek word in itself contains the idea of endlessness is shown both by the fact that they sometimes refer to events or conditions that occurred at a definite point in the past, and also by the fact that sometimes it is thought desirable to repeat the word, not merely saying “forever,” but “forever and ever.”^[1]

How long does God’s ṣedeq last?  How long can we count on God’s ethical and moral continuance?  The answer: for longer than you can count.  For more than the lifetimes you know about.  Is that good enough for you?  If it’s not, maybe you should ask, “Why not?”  Other than theological considerations, what would make you want to assert that God’s righteousness is “eternal,” and mean “endlessly uncountable”?  Perhaps it’s the penchant of Christian theology to treat God as limitless—in power, presence, and time.  You know, the Christian triumvirate: omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient.  The roots of those ideas can be traced back to Greek philosophy, not Mosaic revelation, although now they show up on all sides of the Jewish-Christian landscape.  I’m afraid those wandering nomads of Israel and the early Israelite kingdoms weren’t concerned about the essence of a transcendent divinity.  They were worried about God-among-us while they sought to establish their presence in hostile territory.  A God who remained outside of time and space wasn’t very helpful.  Gods disconnected from humanity were called idols.  Maybe we’ve made a mistake with our transcendent version of YHVH.

So, ask yourself, “What do I need to know about God’s ṣedeq?”  “What do I really need to know?”  I need to know that it will remain constant for as long as it has, and as long as I can imagine.  And I can only imagine in human terms.  That’s long enough for me.

Topical Index: ʿôlām, forever, eternal, ṣedeq, righteousness, Psalm 119:142

^[1] Macrae, A. A. (1999). 1631 עלם. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 673). Moody Press.