Hebrew Word Study – Infinite Love – Racham – רחם Resh Cheth Mem

The End of Love

Hosea 2:23: “And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God.”

“I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy.”  That is a powerful statement. However, we cannot see just how powerful it is in the English for the English language does not have a word for the Hebrew word that is rendered as mercy. Mercy was the best translators could do. The word used here in Hebrew is not the Hebrew word for mercy which is chasad.  It is the word racham.  I have written about racham many times and even wrote a book about it. The book is incomplete and I will need to do a second edition of the book. Racham is that perfect love of God. It is a love like a mother has for her newborn baby in her arms.  The baby that just looks up at her with total trust and dependance and love. 

It is a love that we can have for God as Peter declared to Jesus on the beach in John 21:15-17 where Jesus asked Peter if he loved Him.  The word used for love is racham and Peter answered: “Yes, Lord I racham you.”  David in Psalm 18:1 says; “I love (racham) you Lord).  Here racham is in a Qal (simple) verbal form.

In Hosea where God says that he will love or racham it is in a Piel (intensive) form. This shows that even the best possible love we can show to God, God has a love for us that is even deeper. Not only that the word racham when used with God is in a feminine form.  This is more than a marital love, it is a mother’s love.  A love that is sacrificial, nurturing, full of mercy and compassion. 

I was raised in the church, very sheltered from the world. So, the first time I heard about a couple “making love” I was confused.  How do you make love?  I soon learned that this was a gentle way of saying the couple has a sexual relationship. I discovered a strange shift in our cultural use of the word love.  This is particularly seen in our modern movie industry.  Couples no longer say they love each other, but that they like each other.  It is not until they sleep together that they will say that they love each other.  

Even before the physical relationship crept into our English word love it was often used to express the idea of “What can you do for me?”  “Do you make me feel desired, wanted?” Basically, it was defined as: “I love you because…”  Racham love has no because. It is a love that simply exists for no reason at all other than it is something that is natural.  As a mother with her newborn baby in her arms. Why does she love that little thing that gave her so much pain to birth? She will simply say because it is “my baby.” Racham love has no because. Racham love is not earned nor deserved. It is there because God created it. There is nothing that God created that He did not love. 

If I sound like I am struggling to explain this love in natural human terms it is because I am struggling. I am trying to explain something I do not understand. One thing I do know is that racham love has nothing to do with a physical relationship.  It is purely spiritual.  Hebrew ahav love or chav love in the Aramaic is both physical a spiritual, racham exist only in a spiritual realm. 

Despite being perfect love there are apparently degrees to this love. For humans feel racham in a Qal (simple) form but God knows racham in a Piel (intensive) form. That is because God is the total embodiment of racham love.  He is the ultimate bearer of racham in the most intense form that can exist. 

Revelation 21:6 we learn: “And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.”  Now it is taught that this means God is the one who starts from the beginning of creation to the end of creation.  But it is more than that. God is the beginning of racham love and the end of racham love – an end we will never reach. But then what does this idea of being given the fountain of the water of life have to do with that?  Water has been a Biblical symbol of truth and knowledge. No one knew what was found underneath the sea, it was hidden knowledge.  Also, water was rare in the ancient Middle East, particularly in the cities.  Individuals would make a business out of filling containers with water and walking through the city selling the water for a price. People would pay for a drink of water, many went to bed thirsty. The idea of water being given freely, fountains of water was pure luxury.  In the new earth and new heavens, we will be given the knowledge of God freely.  What is that knowledge of God in a nutshell?  It can be wrapped up in one Hebrew word – racham. Everything we need and long to know about God is wrapped up in racham love.

The catch is that racham is in a Piel intensive form with God but only in a Qal form with us. We will never reach that Piel form. If we did we would be God. However, we will spend eternity growing in racham love, deeper and deeper.  Yet, racham is a well that has no bottom to it.  We will descend into that realm of love with God and just continue to go deeper and deeper for all eternity.  According to one rabbi, I heard speak, he explained that that would be our job, our occupation in heaven, learning to know God. 

I once heard my sister in law who has been married to my brother for over 50 years say: “We are more in love now than when we got married.” That is the picture of our relationship with God, we will only grow to love Him more and more, but there will be no end to that growth in love. We will never be able to say, “I now love you to the fullest (in a Piel form).”  For there is no reaching the limits of God’s racham love.

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