HEBREW WORD STUDY – NINETY AND NINE – TISH’EIM  VATASHA’ תעימ ותשׁע  

Exodus 17:1: “And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the Lord appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect.”

Ninety-nine years old may or may not be the same as our ninety-nine years.  Yesterday in my disability bus I drove a man to the food pantry.  He had a caregiver and walked with a walker.  He told me he was 99 years old and would be 100 on July 2.  I could not help but think that this was the age of Abraham when he had a child.  I wondered what would happen to Abraham today if he were 99 and fathered a child. The movie rights alone would set him up for life, such as it was. It is apparent in this story that Abraham does not have a caregiver or a walker at least God told Abraham to walk before him, not walk before him with his walker.  Yet, there is no indication of any disability.  

Time was measured a little differently in those days, so we are not sure of Abraham’s exact age. We know that Abraham and Sarah were of age beyond childbearing years which puts Sarah somewhere beyond sixty years of age and Abraham, well pretty high up there, at least in his eighties and nineties. 

But why does scripture gives such an exact number for Abraham’s age when that number may not correspond to the way we measure years in the 21^st Century?  Would not beyond childbearing years or simply old, be enough?  Why give us such an exact number.  Why 99 and not 100?  What I am saying is that we spend so much time contemplating a 99-year-old man becoming a father that we tend to overlook something very obvious.  The number 99 has some real significance to the ancient Semitic people. For one thing, counting to 100 was about as far as the average person could go.  When you reached 100 that was it, that was all she wrote. Jesus talked of the ninety and nine sheep and the one lost sheep.  There was something psychological to the mind of the ancient Semitic people about 100. 100 sheep was the threshold to being rich.  With 99 sheep, you were not yet rich. But 100 put you in a new tax bracket.  

99 was the number that left you wanting, desiring for more and feeling unfulfilled. Within the ancient Gemetria, 90 is the number for humility and 9 represents divine completeness. Abraham had reached the point of humility and divine completeness.  Maybe it wasn’t so much to test the faith of Abraham (although it surely did that) as it was that God was waiting for Abraham to reach that state of divine completeness in humility before bringing that special child into his life. 

Looking at the Hebrew words for 99 we find it is tisheim tasha’ which comes from a Semitic root meaning a moment in time, a pause before the next event. Even if Abraham was 99 in Western thought, we still need to look at the double meaning behind 99. I believe God chose to use tisheim tasha’ in this passage not so much as to express an age for Abraham but to express the idea to Abraham that even though he was past childbearing years, a period when you now just settle back waiting for the man with the scythe, God appeared to Abraham and said, “Hey, guy, this is just a moment in time, get ready for the next event in your life. 

There may be many of us out there who feel like we are 99 years old physically and just waiting for the 100 to pop up, but God is saying to us, “Yep, you are up there in years and now I am that you have reached the point of  humility bringing you to divine completeness, I am your next assignment. 

Note that in verse 17 we find that Abraham is now 100 years old.  That must have been a long conversation with God to last one year. Ok, I suppose the traditional explanation is correct that Abraham would be 100 when the child was born, but 100 was the number of completion. I think what Abraham was saying was, “Hey God, I’m finished, I reached the end of the race, I’m an old man, I’m tired and I’m ready to just join you and become that bosom that everyone will be talking about in generations to come.”   But God said, “No you are not either.  You are only 99 and you are going to stay 99 until I say you reach 100 (completion).  As long as I give life to this old boy, I expect some good things from him.”