Devotional Lamentations 3:57

Good Morning Yamon Ki Yesepar and Nevim Arith Hayomim:

Lamentations 3:57: “Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee, thou said: Fear not.“

I suppose my first question is, “Is not God omnipresent?”   He is near unto everyone not just to those who call upon Him.  I guess I really need to look at this “near” business.

The word in Hebrew used here for “near”  is “qarav.”  There are really two different usages for this word.  The first is to express the idea of nearness or closeness. The second is to express the idea of the inward parts, the bowels or the heart. Both words share identical consonants which are Quf, Resh, and Beth.  So up until the 7^th century AD it was pretty well left to the reader to decide if this meant that the Lord is “near” or is “in the heart” of those who call upon Him.  Seven hundred years after Christ, the Masoretes came along, took Quf, Resh and Beth and made them into two separate words by putting a different vowel under the Resh.  If the Resh has a “pathah” (short a) under it, then  Qarah means “near,” if it has a Qammets (long a) under it, Qarah means “in the heart.”   For whatever reason, the Masoretes used a pathah and thus all our  English translations follow in lock step and render this as “near.”   Yet, one of the best kept secrets among Bible translators is that they do not always follow the Masoretes direction.  Also deep within the rabbinical community, the rabbis do what we as Western Christians are reluctant to admit  and that is to question the authority of the Masoretes.  Sure the Masoretes followed oral tradition very closely and depended upon the input of hundreds of teachers and for that we owe them some respect, but this does not endow them with the status of being inspired and giving us “God breathed” words.

So at the risk of being called a toad and blasted out of the water, I propose to stand up to the Masoretes and say: “I think you should have used a long “a” and not a short “a.”  Hence, I would render this as; “Thou drew into my heart in the day that I called upon you.”  I’m sorry but having God near is not good enough for me, I want Him in my heart and the original text, hundreds and hundreds of years before the Masoretes came along gives me the right to translate it this way.

This gets even better. Most our modern English translations plug in the word “draw” or “come.”  and render this passage as “the Lord drawing or coming near to me.”  Yet, the word “draw” or “come” is no where to be found in the Hebrew text of this verse.  In fact the word “Qarah” (in my heart) is in a Qal perfect form, a past tense.  The Masoretes pointed it up this way and I think I will not dispute them in this case, however, most our modern translations, for whatever, reason, tend to ignore  the Masoretes at this point and give it a future tense.  My rendering, however, would be: “The Lord was in my heart when I called upon Him.

For me this fits much better.  At an early age I invited Jesus into my heart and He has been there ever since.  He does not need to draw near to a place He already inhabits.  When I call upon Him, He is already right there in my heart.

That brings up another issue, if He is right there in my heart why do I need to call upon him.  The word for “call” is “Qara’” which I discussed yesterday.  Qara’ means to call or shout.   But it can also mean to have a meeting.   Jesus is in my heart 24/7.  We are not always having a meeting, but if I become fearful, I just need to call a board meeting with the chairman of the board and CEO Jesus, explain my problem and he will say: “Fear not.”

When the chairman of the board and CEO says “fear not,” why should I fear, after all it is His corporation that will gone down the tubes.  I signed all rights over to Him 50 years ago and he has kept my little corporation of body, soul and spirit chugging along just fine.