The Significant Name of God (10)
The mysery when no one calls on God’s Glorious Name
André H. Roosma 20 May 2020 (NL original: 8 Jan. 2015)
The book Basic Elements of the Christian Life, by Witness Lee and
Watchman Nee, contains a chapter ‘Calling on the Name of the Lord.’ In it,
the writers refer to Isaiah (properly Yesha‘-yahu)
64: 7 (Part 1; Ch.4, p.35). That is a very significant text, especially
when we read it in context and in view of the Jewish people and the rabbinic
Judaist religion that forbids calling on the glorious Name of God.
So I give the passage here in that context, in as accurate a translation as
possible.1 The prophet speaks to God:
63: 16 For You are our
Father, for ’Abraham does not know us, and Isra’el does not recognize us;
You YaHUaH – our Father, our Redeemer – from eternity is
Your Name [LXX: Your Name is upon us from the
beginning]. 17 Why do You make us wander,
YaHUaH, from Your ways, and harden our hearts, so that we do not fear
You? Return for the sake of Your servants, the tribes that belong to You.
18 For unto contempt they have taken possession
of Your holy people; our adversaries have trampled Your sanctuary. 19 We have become like them over whom You never ruled;
and which are not called after Your Name [or: and we did not call Your Name; or: and Your Name was not proclaimed over
us]. 64: 1 Oh that You would
tear the heavens, that You would come down – the mountains would
tremble before Your face 2 like fire kindling dry
branches makes the water to boil – to make Your Name known
to Your adversaries! So let the nations tremble before You. 3 When You did awesome things that we did not expect; You came down,
the mountains shook before You. 4 Yes, of old
people have not heard, nor listened. And no eye has seen a God besides You,
Who is acting on behalf of those who wait for Him.
5 You meet him who rejoices and does righteousness,
who keeps remembering You in Your ways. See, You were angry because we sinned
in what we were saved from in the old days. 6 We
are all as unclean, and all our righteousnesses are as a menstruation cloth;
and we all fall like a leaf, and our iniquities carry us away like the wind.
7 And there is no one who calls on Your Name,
who stirs up himself to take hold of You; as if You hide Your face from us and
melt us in the hand of our iniquities. [the Dutch NBV
translation paraphrases this well: You have made us despondent and turned us
over to our own misconduct.]
8 But now, YaHUaH! You are our Father;
we are the clay, and You are our Potter, and we are all the work of Your hands.
9 YaHUaH don’t be so angry, and don’t
remember iniquity forever; look, behold, we are all Your people.
10 Your holy cities have become a wilderness,
Tsion has become a wilderness, Yerushalaïm a wasteland.
11 Our holy and glorious house, where our
fathers praised You, is burned with fire; and everything that was dear to
us has become a ruiin. 12 YaHUaH!
would You hold back on these things, would You be silent, and oppress us
too much?
What is immediately noticeable is the difference between the Masoretic
Text and the Septuagint in verse 16 of chapter 63. I do not exclude that the
Septuagint goes back to an older text variant. “Your Name is upon us from the beginning” is a notion that is
very much in line with what God says elsewhere, including in the ’Aharonic blessing in
Numbers 6: 22-27. Since the foundation of the people and the state of
Isra’el, the priests had the task of putting God’s Name on the people
by blessing them with God’s joyful and proud face. As we have seen1, God’s Name stands, among other things,
for His presence. So that God’s glorious Name was upon them meant that they
could live in God’s presence.
However, because the priests had failed to obey this command, people were
no longer aware of God’s presence and their lives had also slipped away from
Him. At one point, God could not help but let them experience the consequences.
The following verses describe that. Their lives looked as if they were not
children of God, so they did not bear His Name, and as if God’s Name had not
been called upon them, because indeed God’s Name was no longer called upon
them (verse 19).
This also resulted in God’s glorious Name being blasphemed instead of
exalted among the other nations. Consider how during the days of Moses and
Joshua, and later also under David and Solomon, the whole world had come under
the impression of, and had stood in awe of the God of Israel; the glorious
Name YaHUaH was honored everywhere! But now the other nations scoffed, because it seemed as if the God of Isra’el
could not compete with the idols of the Babylonians ... The whole people of
Yehudah (the Jews)
had been heavily humiliated and stripped, and thus exiled
to Babylon !
What is striking is the use of words in verse 6 of chapter 64: “our iniquities carry us away like the wind” The wind
blows away that which is very light in weight. Hebrew thinking equates honor
and dishonor with weight: light weight is dishonorable, weighty is honorable.
Regarding God’s glorious Name, the command is: not to make Him light but to
honor Him. This was not done and so God actually paid them back with equal
currency ...
So then the verse I would like to put the spotlight on here: verse 7.
“And there is no one who calls on Your Name, who stirs up himself to take hold of You; as if You hide Your face from us,
and make us melt in the hand of our iniquities.”
Instead of as if, we can also translate:
so that.2 Yes, I often see the two together: not invoking God’s glorious Name and
people thinking that God is hiding. Or that God is hiding because people
show no interest or appreciation and respect for Him (cf. Rom.1).
This clearly shows the great importance of honoring God by invoking
Him by His glorious Name YaHUaH!
The prophet cannot but confess this and speak to God about His Fatherhood
– that is, His faithfulness to His people. Not the faithfulness of
the people to Him, but the faithfulness of YaHUaH to His people is
the basis of his prayer! Note that in that prayer the prophet mentions
the glorious Name YaHUaH three times!
Hallelu YaHUaH !
Literature reference
Witness Lee en Watchman Nee, Basic Elements of the
Christian Life, Vol. 1; Living Stream Ministry, 2003.
Notes
1 |
The names in the Bible have meaning. That is why I
transliterate them carefully so that they remain recognizable. Especially
the glorious Name of God I represent here as accurately as possible from the
oldest Hebrew original, instead of replacing this grand personal Name of The
Most High by a common word, such as ‘Lord’. For more background
information see: André H. Roosma, ‘Life, security and belonging in joyful adoration,
from the hand of God’ , brief Hallelu-YaH article about the Biblical Name of God in the earliest
Hebrew (old Semitic) script, January 2011. André H. Roosma, ‘The Shema‘
– the First Testament declaration of faith (1)’, Hallelu-YaH! web article, February 2012. André H. Roosma, ‘The
wonderful and lovely Name of the God Who was there, Who is there, and Who
will be there’ , extensive Accede! / Hallelu-YaH! study, July 2009. |
2 |
The Hebrew ki that I translate here by as
if, indicates a logical connection between the two parts of the phrase.
Many translations translate it here as for or because, but that
turns around cause and effect. Here is as if a better translation.
Possibly also and therefore or such that: “And there is no one who calls on Your Name, who stirs up himself to
take hold of You; with the consequence that You hide Your face from us,
and make us melt in the hand of our iniquities.”. |
|