Rerun

Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.  Psalm 119:1  NIV

According to – When we began the long study of Psalm 119, we started by investigating the Hebrew terms for “blessed,” “blameless,” and “walk.”  But we probably should have taken a long look at the preposition bĕ as well.  There’s nothing particularly unusual about this preposition.  Harris notes: “A very common preposition with a wide range of meanings.  BDB list mainly: in, at or by, with (of accompaniment or of instrument), a verbal complement of specialized meaning, and, used with the infinitive construct, to introduce a temporal clause. Currently the Hebrew prepositions are recognized as having an even wider range of meaning. Ugaritic evidence indicates that bĕ also often means ‘from,’ as does the preposition lĕ (Gordon, UT 19: no. 435; AisWUS 486).”^[1]

But we might have expected ki with an English translation like “according to.”  Certainly the psalmist had ki available.  So why did he choose bĕ.  Was it just habit or is there something else here?  We can begin by asking, “What’s the difference between ‘according to’ and ‘in’?  If we translated the verse as “who walk in the law,” does it change anything about the meaning?  Well, sort of.  If I walk according to the Law, the sense is that the Law is something separate from me, something that regulates me, an external code that I subscribe to.  But if I walk in the Law, that has a more complex sense.  It suggests that I am identified by the Law, that my being alive is found inside this code, that I don’t have a separate identity that subscribes to an independent set of regulations but rather my identity is part-and-parcel with these regulations.  I am the embodiment of the code.  I would argue that the Hebrew connection to the Law of God is not simply accidental, as if the Law existed as one thing and I exist as something else and the two things are only coincidentally connected.  I would argue that the Hebrew sense of identity is integrally involved with the Law code given by God through Moses.  Being Hebrew, at least for the psalmist, is being inside God’s covenant and that covenant is manifest in the Law.  There is not one thing without the other thing.

If this is the case, then the opening verse of that long acrostic sets the stage for all the rest of the articulation of God’s righteous will.  Every verse from this point forward speaks of who I am in God’s world, and every verse is a praise for the regulation, instruction, nurturing, and history of God’s Torah.  There is no God without the Hebrews and there are no Hebrews without Torah.  Perhaps we should have noticed this from the beginning.  The Bible does not present God as some independent Sovereign Being apart from His covenant with the descendants of Abraham.  God may exist without Israel, but if that were the case, we would know next to nothing about Him.  We know Him because of His relationship with Israel and that relationship is absolutely tied to His Torah.  Replacement is impossible.

Topical Index:  bĕ, in, ki, according to, Law, identity, Psalm 119:1

UT C.H. Gordon, Ugaritic Textbook, 1965

AisWUS J. Aistleitner, Wöterbuch der ugaritischen Sprache, 4th ed., 1974

^[1] Harris, R. L. (1999). 193 בְּ. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 87). Moody Press.