Hesed

Author: Samuel C. Long
Publisher: CBE International

From beginning to end, the story of Ruth captures the attention of the reader. Though a story of the ebb and flow of ancient human existence—famine and death, gleaning and feasting—the story and the character of Ruth have transcended these ordinary occurrences. Ruth contains many elements that make for good story—tragedy, conflict, romance, and redemption to name a few. This gripping story causes “the emotions of the reader to fluctuate between hope and despair until the very end when what began with multiple tragedies comes to a triumphant and happy conclusion.” Perhaps the evocative nature of the story contributes to the vastly different uses of this book and the character of Ruth. Dante calls her the “gleaner-maid, meek ancestress” of David; Bunyan casts her as Christina’s youthful companion Mercy; and Milton uses Ruth as the paradigm for a virtuous young lady. Indeed, the book of Ruth continues to be one of the most beloved among the OT scriptures. In four short chapters, the author draws the reader into the ancient Israelite experience and tells a delightful story of faithfulness and redemption. When compared with OT literature containing harsh denunciations and warnings for the Israelites regarding their conduct, Ruth’s simple tale describing a time when Israelite society functioned as God intended is refreshing.

‘O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever’ (Psalm 106:1).  What understanding of the hesed (steadfast love) of Yahweh emerges from the Psalter?  How is it expressed in the different literary forms found in the book?

The document seeks to explain the definitions of ‘hesed’ as seen in the Psalms.  It is framed in the format of a letter that is addressed to Torence who is struggling to understand God’s love as a result of suffering abuse from his father as a child.  (The writer of this document has never suffered this kind of abuse therefore the most sincere of apologies are extended if certain aspects within this paper seem offensive or diminishing of the actual trauma suffered by victims of abuse.)  The letter explains that God’s hesed is strong, loving, steadfast and based on His covenant with us.  It describes hesed as being abundant, great, everlasting, wonderful, priceless, good, proclaimed, trustworthy, better than life, as bringing joy, something that evokes our gratitude and for which we should pray.  The letter focuses mainly on Psalms 106 and 17 and touches briefly on 89.  It shows how hesed is remembered in psalms of praise, hymns, royal psalms, thanksgiving, wisdom psalms, and especially laments.  The ultimate goal of this letter is to try and get the reader to think about how God’s hesed relates to their own life especially in times which are troublesome.

The book of Lamentations has been noted in biblical scholarship for its peculiar acrostic structure, a feature which makes the book unique in the OT in terms of style and literary unity. Taking inspiration from the possible meaning(s) of this structure, coupled with a detailed analysis of the central verses (vv. 22-24) of the middle poem (Lam 3), this author seeks to juxtapose the beacon of hope in the midst of lament for the destruction of Jerusalem with the experience of the Nigerian nation in the wake of religio-political terrorism and chronic system failure. God’s proofs of mercy (ḥeseḏ) and respect for law and (acrostic) order are put forward in the final analysis as divine and human panacea, just like faith and reason, in rekindling the light of hope for the nation.

The complication in a study of the Hebrew word hesed (חֶסד) is conveying an adequate
English understanding of the Hebrew concept. Language is never a one-for-one equivalency, but the practice of translation is one of discovering and conveying concepts into one’s own terms and language. In this case, the vessel of English terminology is too limited to relay hesed in one single word. The best understanding of hesed would come from a thorough knowledge of the Hebrew language and, with that, extensive time spent engaging in focused reading. It would only be by this method that one might be able to catch all the nuance of the word as it is used in various contexts and thus come to a comfortable understanding of its range of semantic domain. Despite this challenge, it is the purpose of this paper to introduce the reader to three helpful tools to come nearer to a robust understanding of hesed. To facilitate this, we will briefly examine the way in which it is employed in the context of divine usage, in the context of human usage, and then we will see the concept displayed in the reunion of Jacob and Esau in Genesis 32-33.

The Christian virtue of love formulated in the Bible has been shaped by many centuries and by different concepts. The foundation of this process is found in the Hebrew concepts relating to love. Changing the language to Greek has demanded an effort to try and find the best concepts which imitate the richness of the Hebrew meanings. That resulted in some of them being expressed by notions that did not relate to love. What is more, the four Greek words that designate love did not have the same meanings as in Hebrew. Selected from among them, the word agapē actually was transformed and recreated by the Judeo-Christian culture to become the key word expressing the virtue of charity

The first part of the article deals with four different understandings of Hosea 6:6 in the context of that entire book: (1) the repudiation of the cult as such; (2) the rejection of a particular notion of cult; (3) the priority of ethics over the cult; and (4) the symbiosis of cult and ethics, i.e. that an authentic cult interweaves ethical values and proper ritual conduct. The author concludes that the fourth interpretation best fits the message of the Book of Hosea. The second part of the article deals with the problem of the textual Vorlage which would have been used by Matthew. He seems to have quoted the Hebrew text in a way that remains faithful to his contemporary hermeneutical rule, according to which each element of a biblical parallelism was to be interpreted separately, based on the belief that every single line carried equal weight and conveyed a new truth or a new law. The Matthean rereading of Hosea 6:6, the focus of the third part, is presented from two perspectives: the synchronic and the diachronic. In the synchronic presentation, the main point of concern is the contribution of the quotes in 9:13 and 12:7 to the understanding of those Matthean pericopes. Finally, the diachronic reading deals with the Matthean use of Hosea 6:6 within the context of the Matthean community and its dialogue with the Rabbinic Judaism of that day.

The Hebrew word, hesed, is not one with a singular or simple definition; it is a Hebrew concept that takes a comprehensive study to extract and better comprehend its full meaning, which is undertaken in this study. To aid our understanding of this concept, I first lay the groundwork for coming near an understanding of hesed by examining it in its divine context and usage, illuminating its covenantal, relational, and enduring nature. I then contrast this with an examination of hesed as used in its secular and human context and usage, noting that a universal understanding of its divine usage is impractical for all occurrences in scripture. By examining a few disparate usages of this word in different contexts, I show the unifying aspects of the two understandings (divine and human) in order to come to a more comprehensive and inclusive understanding of hesed. In order to illustrate the concept and to come nearer to a proper understanding of this concept, I then draw on the pericope of Jacob and Esau’s reunion, showing it to be a situation in which hesed is displayed in both divine and human contexts.

The first part of the article deals with four different understandings of Hosea 6:6 in the context of this prophetic book: (1) repudiation of the cult as such, (2) the rejecting of a specific kind of cult, (3) the priority of ethics over the cult, and (4) the symbiosis of cult and ethics, i.e. that an authentic cult interweaves ethical values and proper ritual conduct. The author concludes that the fourth interpretation best fits the message of the Book of Hosea. The second part of the article deals with the problem of the textual Vorlage which would have been used by Matthew. It seems that he quoted from the Hebrew text, being faithful to a then-current hermeneutical rule by which each part of a biblical parallelism was interpreted separately, based on the belief that every single line carried equal weight and conveyed a new truth or a new law. The Matthean relecture of Hosea 6:6, the focus of the third part, is presented from two perspectives, namely synchronic and diachronic. In the synchronic presentation the main point of concern is the contribution of the quotes in 9:13 and 12:7 to understanding the Matthean pericopes. Finally, the diachronic reading deals with the Matthean use of Hosea 6:6 within the context of the Matthean community and of its dialogue with the Rabbinic Judaism of the day.

Although scholars recognize the ποιεῖν ἔλεος μετά phrase as a Semitism referring to observing covenant faithfulness rather than to practicing general ethical mercy or compassion (e.g., BDF, §206; BDAG, 636; Marshall, Luke, 450; Strauss, Davidic Messiah, 101; Fitzmyer, Luke, 888), its implications have not been consistently applied within the context of Luke 10:25–37 for understanding Lev 19:18. The paper first surveys the widespread use and consistent covenant context of the ποιεῖν ἔλεος construction in biblical and post-biblical literature. Special attention will be paid to its often overlooked usage in Jas 2:8–13 (vis-à-vis Ruth 1:8), which provides a striking parallel to the argument of Luke 10:25–37. Possible intertextual allusions relating to Luke 10:37 (Exod 34:7) and to the Samaritan parable itself (Hos 6:6) are then also discussed in scholarly interaction. Against this backdrop, the paper argues that the purpose of the Samaritan parable (10:37) as an interpretation of Luke 10:27 is not to universalize Lev 19:18 into a general call to love outsiders. Rather, its goal is to reinforce the meaning of Lev 19:18 as a call to maintain covenant loyalty by loving one’s fellow covenant members, thereby inheriting eternal life (Luke 10:25, 28, 37b).