HEBREW WORD STUDY – YIREDU ירדו
Genesis 1:28: “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.”
As I look at all the modern Christian translations of the Bible I find that without exception every one of the translations follows thecommon teaching that the word yiredu comes from the root word radah which means dominion, to subdue, to rule over, or to tread upon like in a winepress. Yet, many years ago an old orthodox rabbi taught me that the root word was not radah but yarad which means to lower yourself or come down to the level of another. Since that time I have read numerous stories of rabbis and sages who have communicated with animals through yiredu. Lowering themselves from their lofty position, to listen to the message of the lowly animals.
God meant for His creation to teach us about His nature, to communicate messages of love and care through His creation and the reality of sin through His creation. I recall teaching a Hebrew class to a group of inner-city pastors and I was discussing yiredu or communicating with God’s creation. I saw a lot of doubtful looks so I demonstrated yiredu (I have the names of witnesses). We were in the basement of an inner city church, the concrete jungle and suddenly a bird flew into the basement, over the heads of the pastors and landed on the top of the blackboard above the word yiredu and bobbed his head up and down and then flew off. That pastor said there had never been a bird in their basement before and the doubtful looks left.
In my book Journey into Silence, I talk about communicating with animals if you want more examples. But to keep this brief, let me just say, the next time someone is walking their dog and that dog stops and stares at you, or that little squirrel runs up to you, looks at you and twitches his nose, stop and consider, maybe God is trying to tell you something through yiredu. The Talmud teaches that when a little bird lands near you and starts to sing and dance he is reminding you that the Holy Spirit is very near to your heart. Stop and listen for what the Holy Spirit is trying to say to you.
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