HEBREW WORD STUDY – YOU SHALL SERVE – ‘EVADETEM  עבדתמ  

Exodus 23:25:  “And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee.”

I ran across another grammatical anomaly today while reading Exodus 23:25 in my Hebrew Bible.  Actually, there is nothing grammatically wrong with the passage, it is just curious.  The pronouns you and your are found three times in this verse.  In Hebrew the pronoun you and your have both a singular and plural form.  

What we do not see in the English translations, but is glaringly apparent in the Hebrew, is that the word for service is ‘avadtem  has a plural pronominal ending.  But when it speaks of the blessing on your bread and your water, the words are lachmecha your bread and meimecha your water where the pronoun your is singular. Logically the word your service should also be singular.

Most Christians commentators just overlook this anomaly as another little quirk in the Hebrew not to be given any attention. Yet, the sages do give it proper attention, because they believe every little hiccup in God’s Word carries an important message. That message is a bit strange but when you meditate on it, it makes sense.

The idea is that when you pray alone you are still praying for and together with  the entire community of believers.  You may have a thousand people eating together but each is eating for their own sake.  It is like one comedian who said he got fat by public service  because as a child his mother always said; “Now eat you all your vegetables because many in the world do not have enough to eat like you do.”  So by eating his vegetables he felt he was helping to solve world hunger.  But if you say: “Now pray because there are many in the world who are forbidden to pray”, well that prayer will benefit all the Christians in the world. 

That is why the eating and drinking water are singular, because you eat and drink water for your own benefit, but when you serve God you are not serving God for your benefit but for the benefit of others. 

The word for serve that is used here is ‘eved which means to work or labor for another’s benefit.  It is sometime used for a slave or servant.  The idea of ‘eved is that you receive no benefit for yourself in the labor you perform.  Now I know serving someone like working at job has personal benefit in the terms of a paycheck, but that is not ‘eved.  “Eved is merely working for someone else for their benefit and your reward is having done something for someone else. 

Curiously, there are occasions both in Biblical and extra Biblical literature where ‘eved is used  to express the idea of worship.  I confess that I am often guilty of complaining about that horrible music they play in churches today.  I am a product of the old hymns and Gospel music.  What passes for worship music today is something I just can’t get into.  Yet, when I find myself in a church service singing these new fangled “I like God” songs I have to take hold of myself and remind myself that my worship is ‘eved.  I am only worshipping God to serve Him and my community of believers and just because a song does not tickle my ears does not mean I cannot ‘eved.  I  worship God for His sake and that of my brothers and sisters, not for my enjoyment.