for the Love of God

from the "Glory of the Lord" vol. 6, pp. 239-245

In these pages von Balthasar talks of the prophet Hosea.

“Something completely new is beginning to surface in Hosea. Israel's falling away from the God of the covenant to the Canaanite fertility gods and their rituals was literally a sinking down to a culticly justified fornication. When the people 'departs' from Yahweh to 'go whoring' (4. 12; 9. 1), this ends in the drastic situation in which sexuality becomes central, the situation that shows the depth of the abandoned and desecrated covenant in a completely new light.… God takes hold of the sexual dimensions of his prophet Hosea in order to portray himself therein in his supra-sexual relationship to Israel. God embraces the sphere of male and female gift of self in the flesh, in order to make use of it as an instrument of revelation on the basis of

Von Balthasar, through quotations from Hosea shows how God and his wrath first strips Israel of it's identity and shuns her. The wind of the Lord shall come, rising from the wilderness: and his fountain shall dry up, his spring shall be parched. Thus the fertile land, the perceptible sign of the covenant, will be dissolved backwards into a wilderness that bears no fruit--precisely the wilderness out of which Israel came to begin with. This is God's judgment: I will strip her ,the unfaithful one, naked and make her as in the days she was born and make her like a wilderness and set her like a parched land, and slay her with thirst.

Unable to maintain his anger, despite her unfaithfulness, he cannot abandon Israel. God recalls his first relationship with his chosen people. From chapter 10 of Hosea, 'When Israel was a child, I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son… It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of compassion, with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who lifts the child up to embrace it; and I bent down to it and fed it.

And then the God who judges woos his people again. 'therefore, behold, I will lure and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her… And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt".

Quoting von Balthasar:

“Thanks to the mediating obedience of the prophet in the most intimate sphere of human life, there occurs in Hosea a disclosure of the heart of God which is new and unheard-of when compared with all that has gone before. In pure obedience, Hosea overcomes… the world of the mythical deities which have fallen prey to sexuality, and is able precisely through this, to bring to light the love of God which is supra-sexual. God suffers under Israel's false love affairs, he cannot bear them, and we see him as it were wavering between mercy on the guilty wife and the necessity of punishing her ruthlessly. 'What shall I do with you, O Ephriam?' (Hosea 6:4). It is love that wins the day: 'how can I give you up, O Ephriam!… My heart recoils within me, my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my fierce anger, I will not again destroy Ephriam; for I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst' (Hosea 11:8-9). Although the word is not used, it is the kabod [glory] of Yahweh that reveals itself in a new, incomprehensible depth as the love that lies beyond wrath and has to do with God's being God, with his absoluteness. But this unattainablely transcendent element is at the same time profaned by human beings in the world and humiliated by them, since it's love carries it to the point of defenselessness. The adulteress is purchased for fifteen shekels of silver…’ (3-2), so that she may sit still beside the Lord once more. And he 'allures her seductively' (2-16) so that he may speak to her heart. Hosea is commanded to 'love' this woman: this is the word that expresses the love between man and woman ('hb), with the difference that in him it is selflessly helpful while in her it is lascivious and full of desire. Hosea’s message meets with no greater acceptance than that of the major literary prophets: 'The prophet is a fool! The man of the Spirit is mad!' (9-7); he is expelled from the land. Even in this fate, he declares something of the ‘foolish’ God's love as he runs after a faithless harlot. God has begun to do something here that will not come to a stop until Golgotha."

Sedek - Correct Action and Blessings

 I’ve long held the notion that our actions produce good or not depending on our intention in performing them. I’m sure I’ll get some arguments against this idea. It can easily be imagined that people can do things with perfectly well-meaning intentions and have their actions produce some disastrous results. Anthony DeMello’s story of the monkey who put the fish in the tree. When asked why the monkey replied, “To keep it from drowning.”

Von Balthasar’s discussion of the Hebrew concept of sedek provides a somewhat different concept, “immanent righteousness” in the order of the world. This idea he claims was common to all the Orient. The crux of the idea is that the deeds of man inherently have this immanent righteousness in that “they posit a state of affairs to which the one who acts is subject … evil deeds bring at some time or other to light the doom that lies inherent in them for their perpetrator, and the good deeds bring to light their blessing. – And now the part that struck me. – “The one who acts may think that his deed lies in his own power, but in fact it is the deed that takes him into the sphere of its power.”

Sedek, to the Israelite mind, meant both correct behavior and the blessing inherent in it. The whole scheme of immanent righteousness could be applied to the reality of the Covenant and in doing so produces the history of the Deuteronomist: Israel turns away from the Lord with disastrous effects that God permits; Israel repents and cries to the Lord and salvation is effected.

Which of our actions has taken hold of us? What are the blessings they have produced? What destructions have they caused? Much food for thought.

Sedek, sedaka: right conduct in faithfulness

FOR PREVIOUS POSTS ON THE TOPIC SEE POSTS OF FEB 29, MAR 3, 5 & 8

The Greek translation of the Hebrew word sedaka is dikaiosune and in English is translated as righteousness. This word does not adequately convey the meaning it had for a Hebrew in ancient Israel.

Righteousness to the Western mind is considered to be correct behavior with respect to some objective standard. The Hebrew sedaka can be described as the highest value in life, that upon which all life rests when it is properly ordered; a value so universal that its totality embraces everything transcendental in reality and as such escapes attempts at a precise definition.[1]

 Righteousness, when considered as an aspect of relationship, is achieved when the relationship is “in good order”. “… the easterner lives within the relationship and knows intuitively and generally when it is in good order without defining the … various aspects of the experience that have given him this knowledge….”[2]

To the Oriental mind the one who watches over the just order, be it judge, king or God, must consider as primary, protecting the rights of the weak against subjugation by the strong. In Israel the Covenant God is the supreme protector of the right of the poor, the oppressed, and the powerless. Those who represent the law must hold God’s position, a chief theme of the preaching of the prophets.

 As a society do we have the intuitive ability to recognize whether or not our various relationship are rightly ordered? Has our individualistic nature and materialistic nature skewed our idea of what a right order is?

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[1] See Glory of the Lord, Vol. 6, p163

[2] Ibid., p. 164

Chen

Towards the late OT period the concept of chesed (see post of March 5th) begins to lose its legal and contractual sense and morphs into a tone of “pure favor and grace”. Balthasar points then to a word more consistent with the idea of this later period, chen, which he goes on to describe as “the element of favor, of the bestowal of a favor … the idea of a kindness to which no one may lay claim”.


He goes on, “Do I find chen with you? Means: Will you turn your favor freely in my direction? Ruth finds chen with Boaz, David with Saul and with Johnathan; Joab finds chen with David when his request for the return of Absalom is granted. When Hadad flees, he finds chen with Pharaoh; Esther finds chen with the King.”

This idea, used at first with respect to human relationships also was used in the sense that chen could be the quality through which one obtains favor for himself through charm or lovliness. However, God is able to bestow his favor on whoever he chooses without respect to person. The idea of chen is not a part of the covenantal relationship and cannot be an expectation of man. Again, quoting Balthasar:

“The same is true of rachamim, ‘mercy’ … a reaction that man in hope attributes to God; he cannot actually (in terms of the covenant) presuppose that this exits in God, but he needs it bitterly when he must find God’s forgiveness for himself as a sinner, and the re-establishment of fellowship with him. God himself says that he feels this compassionate mercy for Jerusalem (Zech 1:16). The initial reference of the word (chen) is wholly to human feeling … and may have originally meant the act whereby the father expressed his definite will to acknowledge the newborn child. …it is used of God as the one who has mercy on Israel and especially of the poor, the widow and the orphans in Israel.
In this way, the covenantal relationship between God and the people takes on an inner richness, light and warmth. A sphere of common life and fellowship is opened up: man has the right of access to this because he has affirmed the covenant, but the contents and extent of this sphere cannot be calculated …”

Man affirms the covenant through, “… fear of the Lord, which is the basis of all wisdom … [and] places man only in that distance of reverence which permits true and unlimited intimacy with God.”

Chesed - kindness

Chesed, chen, rachamim – kindness, mercy, favor


Balthasar goes on to describe the nature of the OT covenant. He does it by using several Hebrew words that in some cases give the concept a flavor that has been altered or nuanced differently through translation. One of these words is chesed.

Quoting from pages 159 and 160:

“Chesed belongs primarily to the sovereign Lord who establishes the alliance, in this sense the word means … benevolence, grace, love; but following on from this, the inferior partner who enters the covenant must live in accordance with the favor which has been bestowed on him, he must … reflect it back and order his general behavior … in keeping with chesed.”

This conduct appropriate to the favor bestowed must be based on the root of the covenant being “a personal, benevolent, loving attitude that indicates and opens up a sphere of mutual trust.”

“Naturally, in the alliance between God and Israel, it is only God who can show chesed … God offers man his grace like a gift to a bride so that the only possible response of man to God is the free gift of his heart.”

“… chesed cannot be thought of without the idea of reliability and truthfulness, (emeth), and … salvation and pacification (shalom)” these are closely related to chesed. “To appeal to God’s chesed does not mean merely to cry out to his grace, but also to remind him of his covenantal fidelity by giving signs of repentance and conversion which allow God to see that one still stands by this covenant of faithfulness. One dares to remind God of his fidelity to the covenant and to depend on this as something that is already present by grace … the entire mutuality of the alliance rests on the originally one-sided initiative of God’s grace … especially when the man who has sinned has once seen that he has no right to God’s mercy (rachamim) … a new and free bestowal of God’s grace is necessary in order for the relationship of chesed and emeth to be restored.”

I find the warmth, protection and love offered by God in his covenant very comforting. Being a sinner though, I might be a bit sheepish about reminding God of his promised faithfulness.

Covenant - An Old Idea?

Quoing Vol. 6 of The Glory of the Lord

“The people will be granted admittance to God’s own royal realm, to the extent that it is willing to accommodate itself to the images and attitudes that hold good for the king.” This is the way Balthasar frames the covenantal relationship.


Balthasar continues, "Deuteronomy … separates the paradox of the living community that has been established into its two complimentary parts: the utter one-sidedness of the grace of God, which establishes the community, and the utter mutuality which is based therein: word and answer, love and answering love, directive and obedience.” P.155

This covenant is made:

With the election of this one people, for which no reason can be given:

For you are a people holy to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on earth to be his people, his treasured possession. It was not because you were more numerous than any other people that the Lord set his heart on you and chose you – for you were the fewest of all peoples. Deut. 7:6-7

Without any merit on the people’s part:

Do not say to yourself, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.” Deut. 8:17

On the basis of love alone:

Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who maintains covenant loyalty with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations, …. (Deut.7:9) … yet the Lord set his heart in love on your ancestors alone and chose you, their descendants after them, out of all the peoples, as it is today. Deut. 10:15

The only possible response to this love is unlimited love:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. (Deut.6:5) You shall love the Lord your God, therefore, and keep his charge, his decrees, his ordinances and his commandments always. (Deut. 11:1) “If you would only heed his every commandment that I am commanding you today – loving the Lord your God, and serving him with all your heart and all your soul … (Deut. 11:13)



To the Israelites this covenant would look like a pretty good deal. Rescued from the captivity of the Egyptians, being sheltered from the vicissitudes of the environment and protected from the many peoples who could ravage them, God’s proven protection was an offer that could not be refused.

What is the relevance to us? We are so sophisticated. Many of us have the necessities of life – food, shelter and clothing. We have established a civilization that for the most part protects us from famine, floods and other hardships of the natural world. We have established laws and ethical standards to safeguard our rights. So now we have become self-assured. That old concept of a covenant is out of fashion. We can protect and provide for ourselves.

This reminds me of the story of the business man on his way, and late for an important meeting. Arriving and finding it difficult to find a parking space, he begins to pray and offer to God all sorts of promises if he could just get a spot to park. After reaching desperation levels and promising much to God he finds an opening just where he needs it. With much relief he offers his final prayer, “Never mind Lord, I found one.”

Berith - Covenant

“You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my berith, you shall be my own possession among all the peoples; for all the earth is mine. And you shall belong to the realm of my royal lordship as the first who are at the right hand of the king and as a consecrated people.” (Ex 19.4-6a)

This is the covenant God will make with Israel.

Balthasar makes two points about this covenant.

“And the manner in which this divine ‘I’ addresses and lays hold of the people that stand before him at the mountain of God shows two things: first, the fact that this living God enters upon a relationship with this crowd of human persons in a special manner that sets a mark of distinction upon them, is in an elemental manner … pure one-sided grace. Second [this relationship]… lays claim to them in a total and unconditional way: what is at stake here is not something that is merely ‘interior’ and ‘ethical’ or ‘cultic’ but at the same time the whole external, ‘legal’ and ‘political’ existence of the group.”

He goes on to make the point that this idea of an all-encompassing covenant that includes the ethical as well as the spiritual aspects of their lives was not a radical idea for the Israelites. Their cultic leaders were their political leaders as well. We have lost this idea. We have made our spiritual lives divorced from our political lives. We are fearful of religious expression in the public square. Living a life of conviction and integrity, the desire to form a community that is able to live in accord with their beliefs, is frowned upon and labeled intolerant. We now live in a place and time when we cannot take pride in the mark of distinction God has graciously bestowed on us without being ostracized.

Our more radical Muslim brothers and sisters take this idea of an all-encompassing relationship with God to violent extremes and thereby give it a bad name. The more modern and moderate Muslim reformers are struggling as well. They are attempting to come to terms with the modern world and still hold on to their belief that their God is what drives their entire life and this adherence to God in all aspects is the integrity God asks in response to his covenant with us.

This we have in common with them.

This post has taken an entirely different path than when I began writing it.

God's Initiative

As part of my Balthasar project I’ve recently started Volume 6 of “The Glory of the Lord” the topic of which is the Old Covenant. The following is from Chapter C.2.


“When Moses begged that he might see God’s glory, God hid him in the cleft of the rock and passed by him, crying out ‘Yahweh’ Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness’ (Ex 34.6) In this experience, Moses was permitted to see the glory of God ‘from the rear’ as it passed man by. The entire disclosure of God is grace …. When grace is bestowed on Israel, it receives thereby access to God, a place beside him and the right to dwell there. But the primary meaning of grace must be, not that God bestows on the creature, from the far distance of his heaven … but rather that he bends down to the earth and raises man up to himself, making space for him in God’s own realm …. Israel is familiar with a number of words that paraphrase this inexpressibly mysterious process; these all approach the same mystery from various sides ….”

I find the idea very moving that God humbles himself by coming down to the level of his creature so that the creature can be elevated to God’s realm. I know Christ did the same, but, the Israelites came to this revelation thousands of years before Christ. I remember playing with my kids. In order to get into their world I had to get down on the floor and zoom, zoom with the toy cars just like they did, drink the pretend tea and eat the pretend cookies and color the pictures pretending it was hard to stay inside the lines. God’s actions can be compared to this I suppose though the comparison falls short. Yet, the thought of God’s initiative never fails to provide me with a sense of being comfortable in my faith.

Von Balthasar goes on to describe the Hebrew words used in the OT to describe the God revealed to the Israelites:

Berith – Covenant

Chesed, chen, rachamim – kindness, favor, mercy

Sedek, sedaka – right conduct in faithfulness

Mishpat – right [action] which effects salvation

Emeth, emuna – proved excellence (confidence in the action of God)

Shalom – pacified realm of salvation