Back in the USSA

Let us examine and probe our ways, And let us return to the LORD. Lamentations 3:40 NASB (1995)

Yesterday we arrived back in America.  We’ll be here until Thanksgiving and then return to Italy. 

Return – It’s a bit strange arriving on the shores of America.  We’ve been in Italy for several years now, and even though the American terrain is familiar, each time we return it seems more and more like a foreign country.  The political climate has changed.  It just feels different.  Perhaps we’ve become accustomed to the slower pace, the deep family roots, the calm of Parma.  America seems too busy for living.

As I reflect on this change, I wonder if Israel felt the same way.  This prophetic message was aimed at Israel, but it certainly applies to us.  The grammar tells us what steps need to be taken, nationally, corporately and personally.

First, examine.  ḥāpaś, that is, “‘to disguise oneself’, i.e. ‘to have oneself be searched for,’ is the regular Hithpael usage.”^[1]  Isn’t that interesting?  We think of “examine” as probe or search or reveal.  But the Hebrew suggests something else.  Serious soul-searching is recognizing the disguise.  Perhaps it’s not possible to search the man in the mirror.  It takes some outside influence.  In this verse, the verb is a qal (one of the rare occurrences), imperative, imperfect.  This is not a one-time event.  It is continuous recognition of disguise.  The crucial idea of a disguise is that the one who uses such a mask knows it!  It’s the outsider who is fooled.  That might be why the verb is plural—“let us.”  Perhaps serious soul-searching requires community.  The confessee needs a confessor.  Personally, communally, and nationally.  The public is involved in some way, some how.

Second is the verb ḥāqar.  “It can refer to initial phases of a search or the end result, but always connotes a diligent, difficult probing.”^[2]

The Lord is the one who searches and knows us (Ps 139:1: Job 13:9). He probes the heart and examines the mind (Jer 17:10), and if there is sin and unfaithfulness, he is not deceived (Ps 44:21 [H 22]).^[3]

There are only two persons who really know that depth and extent of the disguise.  God is one of them.  To examine is to acknowledge the mask.  To probe is to find out how deeply it goes.

And then . . . return.  Go back.  Šûb.  Familiar to us.

It is the twelfth most frequently used verb in the ot, appearing just over 1050 times. With very few exceptions šûb is restricted to the Qal and Hiphil stems. It appears most often in Jeremiah (111 times) followed by Psalms (seventy-one times), Genesis (sixty-eight times), Ezekiel (sixty-two times), I Kings (sixty-two times), II Chronicles (sixty-one times), II Kings (fifty-five times), Isaiah (fifty-one times).

The Bible is rich in idioms describing man’s responsibility in the process of repentance. . . For better than any other verb it combines in itself the two requisites of repentance: to turn from evil and to turn to the good.^[4]

Return to what was once true.  Go back to where you were before you took the divergent path.  Israel knew exactly what that meant.  Yeshua instructed his followers to do the same.  Go back to the source—Torah.  Perhaps even earlier.  ʿārôm—Genesis 2:28.  Transparent.  My, have we ever fallen so very far.

Topical Index:  ḥāpaś, disguise, examine, ḥāqar, probe, šûb, return, Lamentations 3:40

^[1] Wolf, H. (1999). 716 חָפַשׂ. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 312). Moody Press.

^[2] Wolf, H. (1999). 729 חָקַר. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 318). Moody Press.

^[3] Ibid.

^[4] Hamilton, V. P. (1999). 2340 שׁוּב. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 909). Moody Press.