​Hebrew Word Study – Feign – Shaqar   Shin Qop Resh

Jeremiah 3:10: “And yet for all this  her treacherous sister Judah hath not turned unto me with her whole heart, but feignedly, saith the Lord.”

We have to realize that at the time of this prophecy, Judah was a very religious nation.  They had the temple of God in Jerusalem where the people faithfully worshipped.  The nation was prosperous, from all outward appearances they were a Godly people, yet God said that they had not turned to Him with their whole heart.  

Take a look at this phrase, sister Judah hath not turned.   This is an amazing play on words here.   Every English translation will translate the Hebrew word shavah as return or turn back.   What the translators are doing is looking at the qamtes at the end of the word shavah and assumes it is a feminine ending based upon the reference that Judah is referred to as a sister. This is, after all,  good grammar and proper.  Yet, this dusty old Christian professor can not help but ask: “Why is God referring to Judah as a sister to Israel?  I believe this is a hint that there is a much deeper understanding of our relationship with God tucked away in this verse.

Now remember, the original Hebrew text had no vowel pointings. This came about a few hundred years after Jesus when the Masorites feared that oral tradition would get lost due to the fall of Jerusalem and the Jews being scattered throughout the world.  They felt the need to preserve the spoken Hebrew language in some written form.  So they added vowel pointings to the original Hebrew which had only consonants.  You have no way of knowing how to pronounce a word correctly without the vowels, so they added vowels to maintain a correct pronunciation.  However, at the same time, you really narrowed down the playing field when it came to translation.  

You see in the original text the word we translate as return is spelled Shin, Beth, Hei.   Actually, the word for return is spelled Shin, Vav, Hei.   Because we assume the qamtes (vowel pointing for a) to be a suffix we then assume that the triliteral root is Shin, Vav, Hei.   As I said, this is all very proper and correct.  But when we hold the Masoretic text up to be the inspired word of God, (which it is not) we start to limit ourselves.  The inspired Word of God had no vowel pointings.  Oral tradition gave the vowel pointings and there was some dispute over what the proper vowel pointings should be.  

Ok, let’s just say that the word really is  Shin, Beth, Hei (shabah) as found in the original text.  That word means to be held captive or to be imprisoned. Another root word that comes from this is yasav which means to dwell.  There is also a third root word that comes from this and it is shavuh which means to make yourself like another. 

Lately, I have been struggling with the idea of what it means to give God my whole heart when  I pray: “God take my whole heart, that is the best I can I give you, my whole heart.”  Yet, even while saying those words I feel like I am still falling short.  I guess I fall short because I do not understand what I am saying.  As I looked at Jeremiah 3:10 I have to admit that I am like Judah, I am acting treacherously toward God.  The word treacherously in Hebrew is bagad which in its Semitic root carries the idea of a covering or wrapper.   I am only letting God have my wrapper, my outward appearance, and not what is inside of me, my fears, my pride, my fleshing concerns, etc.  As the passage says,   I feel like I only feignedly give him my heart. That word feignedly is shaqar which means to be deceptive.  To pretend to be affected. Like saying at a funeral “Sorry for your loss” when you don’t feel sorry at all but you want to person to think you feel bad for their loss.

Judah really looked Godly on the outside, they gave their tithes, their sacrifices, and their praises.  They kept the law, they attended worship services, and on the outside, they appeared very holy, but they had only given God their top layer, the wrapper and they were faking the rest.  

But like most Christians, I sincerely want to give God my whole heart, I don’t want to fake it. But what does that mean to give Him my whole heart? Does that mean to live some kind of monastic lifestyle, never enjoying life itself as I you are too busy praying and studying the Word, afraid that even watching a half hour of TV will turn my heart away from God?

That is where I look at the many different plays on the word shavah.  To give God our whole hearts means to be taken captive by Him, to be His prisoner.  A prisoner’s life is ordered.  Many who spend years in prison have a real problem adjusting to freedom, they can not make a decision on their own because decisions were always made for them. Another play on that word is to dwell.  If God has our whole heart, He is dwelling in our hearts, he holds it captive.  The third play on words is that we seek to make ourselves like Him.  

I find Western Christians spending too much time trying to win God’s favor through all their good works, their tithes, their prayers, and even their Bible study (reading) rather than letting God take their heart captive.  In my search for God’s heart, I am discovering that the only way I can know His heart is to allow my heart to be held captive by His. 

You see if you worry that watching a half hour of TV will turn your heart away from God, then you are like a person in prison worrying that he will accidentally walk out of prison. It won’t happen, the only way out is to escape.   If I  have no desire to escape from the prison of God’s heart, then I don’t have to worry that by watching a half hour of television I will accidentally walk out of my confinement any more than a prisoner has of walking out of prison. God is holding me captive.  The only way out is to make a conscious decision to escape, to want that freedom.  

Therein lies the sin of Judah, they did not want to be held a prisoner in God’s heart.  If you truly, sincerely want to give God your whole heart, he will arrest you on the charges of wanting to be a prisoner (shabah) in His heart and will throw you in the prison of His own heart and make you a captive (shabah). He won’t let you escape if you don’t want to. 

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