HEBREW WORD STUDY – ILLEGITIMATE FAMILY MEMBER – BIZARIM בזרמ  

Deuteronomy 32:16; “They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods…”

The phrase “They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods” is only two words in the Hebrew:  Yikeni’ahu  bizarim.   Jack Benny had a routine where he was in some far off jungle and found himself the potential meal for some cannibals.  In desperation, he told his guide to tell the cannibals that he was from a far away country bearing great gifts that would bring joy to them all.  The guide translated to the cannibals: Um ba.”  Jack Benny said to his guide:  “That’s it, all that in just Um ba?   Isn’t there an ula booga in there?”   I tend to feel the same way when I see passages in Hebrew that have one or two  Hebrew words but translate out into a dozen English words.  I can’t help but wonder if maybe the translators didn’t throw a little commentary in there.  Needless to say, there is plenty of ambiguity in these two words would allow us to look at different options in how we would render this passage. 

The first word is yikeni’ahu for jealous which is found in a Hiphal form from the root word kana.  This Hiphal is why we use the English word provoked as this verbal form makes the word causative.  He was caused to be jealous.   However, the spelling of the word is defective, that is that it is an earlier form of the word before the full spelling of the Biblical Hebrew was developed.  This would suggest a broader rendering to encompass the meaning of the root word kana which is used to express the idea of a romantic rival, or a measuring stick.  The translators intensified the causative by inserting the word provoked purely for contextual reasons rather than grammatical.  Had the writer intended to intensify the causative he would have made this an infinitive or added a paragogic.  Hence, I see no reason to say God is provoked, nor do I see any reason to upgrade this word to jealous when grammatically no intensity is indicated and other options seem more appropriate.   To say God is “provoked to jealousy” by other gods, would suggest God is somehow insecure and threatened by these other gods.  I would prefer a more scaled down rendering: “They caused Him to become a measuring rod or a (romantic) rival to strange gods.”   The difference in this rendering moves you from a God who becomes irrational ready to shoot down  His unfaithful mate and her lover, to a God who is looking in a mirror asking: “What does this god have that I don’t have. Am I not good enough for you?”   In other words, the traditional rendering of this passage suggests an enraged God over an unfaithful lover rather than a God who is heartbroken over His lover’s unfaithfulness.  I find this latter rendering fits my style better as I like to think I am faithful to Him not because I fear He will take a rolling pin to my head if he catches me with another god, but rather because I fear I will break His heart.

But say, notice that the word elohim or god is not in this little phrase strange gods.  Again translators put that in there for reasons of context.   Yet, the word used is simply: bizarim from the root word zur which has the idea of loathsome breath like in bad breath. It is also the word used for a harlot or to bind a wound.    Years ago I worked the night shift as a security officer in a residential high rise in downtown Chicago on Lake Shore Drive.   The building is located in what the news media calls the “Viagra Triangle.”   I remember around 2:00 AM letting in a young, attractive, college-aged, woman who looked like she just got off the bus from Kansas to visit her father, a rather prosperous, high profile resident.  This resident had called fifteen minutes earlier asking that I reserve a parking space for two hours for his daughter and to allow her to enter without checking her ID. When my relief came that morning I mentioned the “daughter” and he laughed at me and said: “That gal just didn’t get off the bus from Kansas she has been around for a while.  I realized she was a zur who was given the honored position of a family member but in reality was, let’s just say illegitimate.

The strange god or zur that is mentioned in Deuteronomy 32:16 is anything or anyone who provides temporary relief from our needs, fears, or hurts.  This “strange god” is just a bandage.  It is a god that will break the heart of our God when we turn to it to meet our needs or heal our wounds. Our God stands ready and longing to meet our needs and desires, to heal our wounds.  He stands ready with open arms while we rush off to a rival god and treat it like a father or an illegitimate parent or family member.  We pull out a measuring stick and figure we will go to the god that we think will offer us the best deal.  We are like that little child who will run for a dinner of cream puffs and cakes rather than the fruits and vegetables offered by the loving parent.  Then we go running to the loving parent when we have a belly ache. 

To me, this passage is telling us that our God is a “jealous” God only in the sense that He longs to give us the best and is heartbroken when we settle for anything less