Spiritual Therapy

Your testimonies also are my delight; they are my advisers.  Psalm 119:24 NASB

Advisors – How much would you pay for really good advice?  I suppose the answer depends on the seriousness of the problem.  So, suppose the problem is a life or death issue.  What’s that worth?  Those are the stakes in this verse.  The poet tells us that God’s ʿēdut are his ʿâṣât.  We’ll need to know both of these words before we can assess his claim.

First, ʿēdût.  We’ve already seen this word in the psalm.  Remember?  The root is instructive.  It’s ʿûd, “to return, to repeat.”  “Most frequently this word has a temporal sense. It is used to indicate the continuance of a past or present event.”^[1]  When the poet speaks of God’s testimonies, he doesn’t mean a recounting of all the commandments.  He doesn’t mean a list of God’s governmental orders.  He doesn’t mean a catalog of God’s social statutes.  He means the repeated history of God’s involvement with His people, and all that is included in that history.  God’s faithfulness, His repeated commitment to Israel, His continual dedication to this chosen group, all of this is summarized in ʿēdût.  So, what matters here is the history of God’s involvement.  The psalmist takes joy in remembering what God did.  Recounting God’s actions in the past produces assurances, security, courage, and confidence.  Do we have the same šaʿăšūʿîm (delight)?

The second term is ʿâṣât.  Actually, the phrase is a bit more revealing.  It’s the plural of eesh (men) plus the term ʿâṣât.  The NASB translates this as “They are” but it really suggests that God’s history acts in the role of wise men.  Past actions are like personal conversation.

What, then, is ʿâṣât?  The root is yāʿaṣ, “to advise, give counsel, devise, plan.”  But what’s most interesting is the rabbinic translation into the LXX.  There we find the Greek bouleuō, instead of thélō.  Perhaps there was little difference between these Greek terms by the first century, but the rabbis of the 2^nd Century B.C.E. chose bouleuō because it expresses desire more than rational decision.  Bouleuō is what God’s wants.  Thélō is what God wills.  If ʿâṣât is the equivalent of the Greek bouleuō, then the psalmist is telling us that we should pay attention to what God intended, not necessarily to what actually happened.  The real advisors are God’s objectives and designs.  Man’s interference in those plans is a detour.

We can see this clearly in the opening biblical story.  God did not intend Adam and the woman to experience a broken relationship.  He did not intend the man to dominate the woman.  He did not intend to curse the earth.  It happened, and we must deal with what happened, but the real joy comes from understanding what He wanted for His creation.  Knowing that provides spiritual therapy.

Topical Index: bouleuō, thélō, ʿâṣât, intention, history, Psalm 119:24

^[1] Schultz, C. (1999). 1576 עוּד. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 648). Chicago: Moody Press.