Hebrew Word Study – Plain Path  בְּאֹ֣רַח מִישׁ֑וֹר  Beth Aleph Resh Cheth    Mem Yod Shin Vav Resh

Psalms 27:11: “Teach me thy way, O LORD, and lead me in a plain path, because of mine enemies.”

I recall many years ago praying the following prayer:

Oh Lord:

I am trying to pick up the pieces

On a chapter of my life that has closed

I know, Oh Lord, you expect me to move on

But let me do so with your peace, joy and love  

Let me tell you something, whenever God has led me in some path, it has been anything but a plain path. There is nothing plain or ordinary about the paths that God has led me into. 

Note the Psalmist wants God to teach him the way, but now he wants God to lead him in a plain path. Is path and way the same thing?  Not in Hebrew.  Here the word for path is not derek the usual word for path but ‘orach which also means a way, path or road but it can also mean a passing of life or way of living. This is almost identical to derek yet it is an entirely different word.  As the Talmud teaches there are no synonyms in Classical Hebrew so we need to find the difference between derek and ‘orach.  Derek is a way and a direction.  ‘Orach is a word used for a caravan or a wayfarer.  It is a word used for a seasoned traveler who knows the woods like the back of his hand.  Where the Psalmist wants God to teach him His path, the direction that is new and different to him, he is now wanting God to lead him in the old and familiar paths the ‘orach. 

The word ‘orach in extra Biblical literature is used for the meager and plain rations given to prisoners.  Thus, this way that the Psalmist wants to be led is probably a dull, familiar way, lacking in any real new exciting experiences. It is just the same old same old. In that we don’t need any teaching but we sure do need to be led.  Why do we need to be led down a path that we are familiar with?  The word lead in Hebrew is nachah which means to guide or to govern.  A guide is basically telling you where to go, he is really governing you.  This comes from an old Canaanite word which means to turn your eyes upon something. 

You know sometimes we can become so familiar with something that we just do not see the obvious.  We say that something can be hidden in plain sight.  That is what the Psalmist means when he is asking God to lead him down the familiar paths. Note the adjective next to path or ‘orach which is mishor which means level or straight.  It comes from the root word yashar which is a word used for justice. Justice has the idea of leveling the playing field. I had a woman recently on my disability bus tell me that she did not wish for anything bad to happen to her ex-husband, but she did desire that he experience some kind of hurt to help him realize  and/or understand how he has hurt her.  What she was asking was for justice, the levelling of the playing field, tit for tat.  God is a just God, He will see that those who offend us will understand what that offense is like and those who bless us will understand what that blessing really meant.  I had a man go to bat for me with a problem with my landlord.  I don’t think he realizes what a blessing he has been in my life in that area and others, so I am praying for justice, that this man will experience blessings like he has been a blessing to me.  

So, the Psalmist is asking that God leads him down a familiar path and to make that path straight, smooth or consistent. He is not asking for direction so he can have an easy smooth uneventful journey, but he is asking quite the opposite.  He wants his journey down the familiar path to be just as exciting as the new path.  He wants God to show him things that he would so easily overlook because he is so familiar with this path.

Let me explain it this way.  For some, a particularly new believer, the study of the Word of God is a new and exciting experience.  They are on a derek or a journey of discovery of new and adventurous things and they call out to God to teach them.   Then there are those who have grown up in the church, we have heard literally thousands and thousands of sermons and teachings. I have ten years of undergraduate and graduate study in the finer points of the Word of God.  I have studied the Word of God in the original languages.  I spend a minimum of four – six hours a day studying the Word of God in the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.  I have been a Bible college teacher, I have written and published numerous books on in depth study of God’s Word and I am now old and gray.  My whole life has been involved in the study of the Word of God.  I have read through the Bible countless times in my life. For me sitting through a sermon or listening to some teaching or even opening the Bible up to some passage of Scripture is the same old same old.  The path for me in the Word of God is now an ‘orach more than a derek.  Yet when I pray to God to lead nachah me to some ‘orach mishor straight path or to see something I never seen in this path that I have trodden for over seventy years there is not a day that having the Holy Spirit as my guide that I do not see something in this familiar territory that I have never seen before. It is a discovery that is just as new and exciting for me as it is for a new believer in his derek.   The Word of God is a well that will never run dry.

Even though I am now old and gray, life has yet to become boring or the same old same old as I meet new people every day, new experiences every day.  I find I must cry out to God like the Psalmist, “Teach me in the new and fresh ways and lead me in the ways that are familiar so it will be just as exciting as the new.” 

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