Dove Tales

My mouth will speak wisdom, and the meditation of my heart will be understanding.  Psalm 49:3  NASB

Meditation – “Do you meditate?”  Whenever someone asks me that question, I’m never quite sure how to answer.  Why?  Because I’m not quite sure what meditation really means.  Should I start chanting?  Should I sit in the lotus position and contemplate my finitude?  Should I escape to the wastelands and maintain a vow of silence?  Should I ruminate, cogitate, contemplate, or deliberate?  Maybe I should just “. . . ate”?  By the way, all of these actions don’t require you to become a Buddhist.  Many Christian sages have found solace in these ways.

But I’m not convinced that any of these really express the Hebrew idea of hāgut (הָגוּת).  The noun comes from the verb hāgâ.

The basic meaning of hāgâ and its cognates is a low sound, characteristic of the moaning of a dove (Isa 38:14; 59:11) or the growling of a lion over its prey (Isa 31:4). It is sometimes used in mourning contexts, such as the moaning over the judgment upon Moab (Isa 16:7: Jer 48:31) or the whispering of the enemy after the collapse of Jerusalem (Lam 3:62). Wizards are known to whisper and mutter in their occult practices (Isa 8:19). In distress the psalmist sighs and cries out to God for help (5:1 [H 2]).^[1]

Doves and lions.  An odd pairing, don’t you think?  As far as I can tell, lions don’t sound like doves (and I’m not sure I want to get close enough to really find out).  But I get the idea.  If you ever have the chance to listen to a lion sleeping (carefully), then you might think the sound is like a dove, only about 80 decibels louder.  At least we know this much.  Ancient Israel knew about lions (and they didn’t have to go to Africa to see them).

Now that I think about the sound connection, I guess that I do meditate in Hebrew—sometimes, not very often.  Most of the time, my world is just too full of noise to actually hear the cooing of doves or the breathing of lions.  What I hear are cars driving by my apartment, televisions blaring, door bells ringing, cell phones chiming, and the general hustle of a city.  Maybe you live in the country and these sounds are replaced by other noises.  But either way, we don’t take much time to hear dove or lion sounds these days.  And it’s a shame, isn’t it?  If meditation is anything at all, it’s calming.  Doves seem like very calm birds and lions breathing (but not roaring) are pretty docile.  I guess I could be like that.  I could shut off the distractions.  I could allow myself to exhale the noise of life and inhale the harmony of the creation.  That’s probably the place where doves and lions find symbiosis.

Notice the result according to this verse.  Hāgut is connected to tĕbûnâ, a word derived from the Hebrew bîn, i.e., “understanding.”  Western cultures usually don’t connect these thoughts.  In the West, understanding is an acquisition.  I have to work at it.  I have to gather facts, assess ideas, experiment, draw conclusions, press for information, learn.  But most of all, I have to do something in order to get understanding.  The Hebrew word suggests quite a different approach.  It encourages me to stop doing in order to understand.  I have to calm myself, breathe, slow down, become like the dove or the sleeping lion before I will discover (not acquire) understanding.

It sounds so simple—until I try to make it happen.  And then, of course, I’m doing the very thing that prevents meditation.  It’s just so hard to change 2000 years a culture of getting into a culture of receiving.

Topical Index:  hāgut, hāgâ, meditate, Psalm 49:3

^[1] Wolf, H. (1999). 467 הָגָה. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 205). Chicago: Moody Press.