Holy: Understanding it Better According to Roles

I have been asked two important questions about my work on the definition of holy among others:   1) Who is your audience?  and 2) What is your level of authority or initiative in writing on this topic?   (The latter question is often more implied than stated due to my level of education which is not on the level of a Ph.D. or what is described as the terminal (final) degree.)  Let me answer the first one with "everyone".  Let me answer the second question with the response that "I know my limits or level or degree".  Now I will explain them in the same order. 

First, then is the issue of audience.  Usually when this question is asked, it is asked with 3 possible alternatives: 1) scholars, 2) pastors, and 3) laypeople (laity).  The first is seen as the highest and the third as lowest in terms of having an understanding of written materials through education on the meaning of holy.  There is, I think, an important misunderstanding in the alternatives offered. These alternatives see the whole process of becoming a disciple along one only one directional, while I see it as having two directionals. 

In the diagram above (if it is too small just left click on it for a larger scale), you can see my view in picture form.  It is drawn mainly from the deep and refreshing well of one of my professors at Bethel University (then College), Dr. Donald N. Larson.  He was an important pioneer in trying to develop language schools that would recognize the understanding of languages (and other topics as well) as having two distinct directionals.  He was involved with the Toronto Institute of Linguistics and with other language institutes including one in the Phillipines.  I was very pleased recently to learn that his view and Dr. Wiliiam A. Smalley's view on learning a second language is still being used in a French language learning school for missionaries that is found in France.  Their view was made practical through the Language Acquistion Made Practical (LAMP) text and method of Brewster and Brewster.

These two directionals are significant, because of what Larson and Smalley learned from the study of the success of language teaching programs for missionaries to foreign lands.  Those studies of success point to the primacy of the vertical knower-learner directional over the horizontal teacher-studier (student) directional.  This should make sense to all of us, who have had the opportunity to learn a language from our parents, because in most cases they lacked the formal training for being a teacher.  They were often skilled knowers, who filled our learning minds and mouths with sensible speech.   On the flipside, I can also point to the failure of a teacher-studier directional in junior high.  Our teacher, who taught our class of students French skillfully, failed when she got to France in trying to speak French as the knowers of French do.   What a disappointment this was for her as she expressed in class! 

Now at this point, I need to make a corrective, so that you and I don't run around proclaiming that people only need the knower-learner directional to become a disciple.  No, and again I say no.  Dr. Larson believed that the ideal (and the most successful) is both directionals together.  Being a learner-knower and a studier-teacher is better than only knower-learner, even if that is better than only teacher-studier.  In fact, I would take it a step further and say that both are necessary, if we want to declare ourselves to be disciples.  A real disciple is both a learner and a studier (student).  I will end this discussion here to move on to the next question, but also I could say a lot more on this point to clarify it more and to answer questions you might have.  If you do, feel free to post a question to me below. 

Now from this understanding, lets talk about my intended audience.  These two directionals is part of my reason for why I think my writing goes beyond being classified as narrowly as only for the scholar and the pastor and that it leaves out the layperson.  Sometimes I am speaking directly to what the layperson has learned beautifully.  They are after all, are still disciples and while they may not have reached a terminal degree as a studier and teacher, they certainly can be very advanced as knowers.  Sometimes too I have also met great studiers among laypeople, who have relied on the books of teachers and who have been able to build on the teaching principles that they received in their younger years.  The beauty of all of this self-study is mainly seen in the results of their work and the keen insights they deliver. 

So while each entry can't be for "everybody" everytime, it does mean that among these entries are entries for many classes of people.  It is also true that I am not trying to make this blog into the writing of a dissertation for seminary, though that is something I am working on for my teachers.  Here I leave out the terminology, but that does not mean I don't know the terminology.  It is just that I am aiming for a wider audience. 

Scholars though can certainly fire off questions to me and I can try to answer them to the best of my educational ability in their terms!   While I was at Fuller Seminary I learned this difference from experience.  I wrote what I thought was a very good paper for a class, but I received only a "C".  I didn't understand, so I sat down the the Teaching Assistant for the class.   He told me that I hadn't used the professors terminology frequently enough to show I had grasped the material.  I went back to my dorm and re-wrote the whole thing, doing just one thing.  I practiced inserting the professor's terminology where it belonged and I got an "A".  So to this day I possess two versions of the paper.  This blog is more like the "C" kind, though I can quickly edit it to be an "A" paper, if called upon.  The real proof will be in my paper that I am writing for my S.T.M. on my way toward a Ph.D.

[major break for the second question]

Second then is who can a person trust.  Let me start out by saying that one of the best indications is in the quality of recognizing one's limitations.  But there is even more than that to tell us who is trustworthy. 

Trust is built on being trustworthy and I would summarize the way of building trust, and its close cousin of influence, as being by 4 processes: 1)ethical intelligence , 2)relational intelligence, 3)wisdom intelligence and 4)logical intelligence.    It takes character and competence to build trust. 

Purpose: That everyone knows what I am recommending to them as a course of action on the meaning of holy in the Bible. 

If you are a leader, I recommend that

If you are a missionary of any kind, I recommend that

If you are a pastor, I recommend that

If you are a preacher, I recommend that

If you are a teacher, I recommend that

If you are a board member, I recommend that

If you are a layperson, I recommend that 

Conclusion: That my audience is diverse and so I have different recommendations (not declarations) for each of them as described in this blog entry.  Also certain blog entries will make more sense to different members of my audience. 

[I have thrown out my original plan and this is my outline for a new course for this entry.  Please stop back to see its completion. ]

Holy: Understanding it Better Through the Hebrew Alphabet

"Seek first to understand, then to be understood."    Whether you are a historian and can relate to Francis of Asissi or you are a contemporary follower of Stephen R. Covey or another kind of follower of wisdom, you have heard this one before.  It is very good advice, but it is also hard to remember in the middle of conversation or in the middle of reading of reading a book.  Seek first to understand is my on-going habit, when trying to understand holy. It is not primarily about understanding my words, but God's words. I have been trying very hard over the last couple of years to better understand the alphabet of the ancient Hebrew language and the meaning of each of its letters.  As a result, I have grown in my understanding of qadosh, the Hebrew word for our English translation of holy, through grasping the ancient meaning of each of the symbols that make up the word.  So come along with me and I will show you what I have learned recently. 

I could say a lot about primary and secondary sources.  I have read a great deal of material and viewed a lot of pictures and charts.  There is a broad consensus though on many things, so I am not compelled to list all my sources here.  But there are two that I must mention and also how they differ. 

The first book I ran across that summarizes the work on the ancient Hebrew alphabet or letters and their meanings is that of Jeff A. Benner in his Ancient Hebrew Lexicon of the Bible: Hebrew Letters: Words and Roots Defined Within Their Ancient Cultural Context.  It was a good starting point.  But also as I have begun to understand more, I knew I needed other sources.  So I have gone over quite a number of books that it makes no sense to try to list here.  I did though hear from someone else who is working on much of what Benner was trying to do.  His name is Andre H. Roosma. 

Andre initially wrote to me in response to an earlier blog that I wrote dealing with the etymology of the Hebrew word for holy where I mentioned Benner's work.   His main difference from Bennter is that he tries to stay away from later mystical sources for the meanings of some of the letters.  He also tries to not overstate hypotheticals that contain some uncertainty.  I appreciate his correctives. 

He is currently working on another piece of writing that he is hoping to complete soon.  Before he finishes his writing, I would like to propose my own thoughts based on his work that tries to get at the meaning of words though the letters and their meanings that make up those words.  He is not responsible for any of my modifications and you will have to chech his work first hand to know my changes at: www.Hallelu-YaH.nl/Proto-Semitic.pdf. 

For my purposes, I will use the follow English letters to represent those in the Hebrew for holy: QDYSh. 

Q:  Meaning: "goes full circle (like the sun's course)"            Class: Action              Character: love
D:  Meaning: "delight/desire to enter in (like a door)"            Class: Thing               Character: good
Y:  Meaning: "covenant bond/connection (like a tent peg)"   Class: Relationship     Character: true
Sh: Meaning: "abundance from the source (like breasts)"      Class: Amount            Character: right


ON Q: For a long time there has been this idea that the root or etymology of the Hebrew word for holy had to do with shines or light.  I think the pictograph behind the earliest form of the letter for this word points more to the full course or circle of the sun in the sky.  And what is characteristic of this course is that it runs the full course every day.  It completes its action every day.  I think that gets at the critical point of meaning in that letter and then for the whole word meanng holy. 

Also for Jeff Benner, he believes this letter was later substituted for another (though to the best of my knowledge this is speculative). The orignal letter he believes was there is the Hebrew letter that pictures a wall and is where English likely got its letter "H".  This is critical though to his argument that the entire word means "set apart".  

So linguisticslly, I classigy the referent as mainly to the action of the sun as it is originally pictured like a sun at the horizon of the sky where the sun begins in our view and where it ends in our view.  This is in contrast to a picutre of the sun in the mid-day sky, where reference would likely then be to its light or brightness.   Also if it was a picture that meant to refer to shining it likely would not have only one line indicating a horizon, but instead many lines shing out from the sun like can be found in ancient Egypt or in our day in children's pictures of the sun shining where the rays of sunligh are represented.  Its a view of its action every day. 

That is critical to how I then define the class as parallel to the character of love.  More on this when I summarize the theological implications at the end of this entry. 

ON D: We all have been told when we get in front of a TV we make a better door than window.  Actually, what they should say is that we make a better wall than window, because a door can be opened and you can see through like a window with just a little more effort or convenience. 

So linguistically, I classify the referent as mainly the thing of a door, since it is originally pictured as a tent door or tent flap as opposed to a part of the tent wall.   It is a door in distinction from a wall.  Its a view of its distinctiveness because the "hinge point" of the tent flap is pictured in its pictograph. 

That is critical to how I then place the class as parallel to the character of good. Discernment is about knowing the distinction between good and evil.  A tent wall does not make a good door.  A door does not make a good window (unless you leave it open), etc.  More on thise when I summarize the theological implications at the end of this entry.
 
ON Y: Most of us have set up a tent at one time or another and know that those pegs connect that tent to the ground.  If they don't or if they are loose, then the people staying in the tent could experience trouble when wind arrivese.  The pegs are essentially for connection and that is a primary form of relationship. 

So linguistically, I classify the referent as mainly to the relationship of connection as opposed to disconnection.  The peg is pictured upright as opposed to layig on its side.  This gives you the idea that it is holding securely. 

That is critical to how I then place this class as parallel to the character of true.  True relationships remain connected.  False ones are insecure and do not hold true. 

ON Sh: There are many references to breasts as a source of abundance. 




By the way, some begin from a 3 letter root and only acknowledge that form. 


 Recently, I have worked through


[this blog is in process,  please go back to the month of April and earlier to find full entries]  [this and the five preceding I hope to finish in July]

Jon