and they will attest to you that there is a difference between sixty years of age and seventy years of age.

Transcription

1 HEBREW HAIRS WORD STUDY HOARY HEBREW WORD STUDY HOARY HAIRS SHEYBAH - ש יבת Isaiah 46:4: Even to old age, I am the same and even to hoary hairs I will I carry you. I have made and I will bear, yea I will carry, and will deliver. I have no idea what hoary hairs are. That has got to be old old English. Checking Webster s dictionary I find it simply means gray hairs. If you need a good argument for a modern translation, this verse is a good one. I doubt that anyone under the age of 100 years knows what a hoary hair is. The word in the Hebrew is sheybah which means hoary hairs. lexicons will say gray hairs. More modern Is there a difference between old age and gray hairs? This passage seems to suggest that there is. For us in our culture when we see someone with gray hair we consider them old. Ancient Jewish thought was that when you reach the age of sixty you are considered to be old and when you reach the age of seventy you have hoary hairs. I drive seniors on my bus and they will attest to you that there is a difference between sixty years of age and seventy years of age. The Semitic implication is that when you reach your sixties you are considered old and you turn all your work and duties over to someone younger. In other words your real usefulness has ended but you are still relatively active. In our society it is called retirement. When you reach your seventies then

2 that is the time you become weak and in need of assistance. Don t panic, it is just a generalization. The implication in this passage of Scripture is that God does not change in His involvement with us even when the world thinks we are no longer actively useful in making a contribution to the community. God doesn t remove any of his resources in our lives and pass them on to the next generation. In other words, God does not send you out to pasture. You are just as useful to Him at sixty as you were in your thirties. Even when you reach the point of needing assistance, God will continue to use you, you will still serve a purpose in His kingdom, and His calling on your life has not changed. As long as you have breath you have a purpose for God. If you became disabled in your later years, well God will carry you. That word for carry is sabal. One meaning of sabal is that he will drag you along. If you feel too old and too weak to get out of bed in the morning, He will drag you out of bed and put you to work. You are alive for a purpose, He can make you useful even at the age of hoary hairs. This word sabal is also used for someone carrying a burden for another person. Let s face it after sixty and seventy years of walking on this earth you are going to pick up a lot of emotional baggage. All your failures, your sins, your disappointments keep adding up over the years so that by the time you reach your golden years, they are indeed golden. I mean that in the sense that gold is a very heavy metal and even carrying one gold brick is a real burden compared to a brick made of plastic. But say, this verse repeats this word sabal two times, two times in the verse God assures us that He will carry us. When something is repeated two times in the Semitic language it is done to show an emphasis. God will most certainly carry us or bear the burdens that we bear in our old age.

3 WORD STUDY I AM HE אני הוא Isaiah 46:4: Till you grow old, I will be the same, when you grow gray, it is I who will carry; I was the maker and I will be the bearer. And I will carry and rescue you. When the Babylonians conquered Judah, they took the royal family as well as the best and strongest into captivity. Daniel and his friends were among them. Left behind were the elderly, the young children, the weak, diseased and those who were unable to do any valuable work. In other words families were torn apart, wives separated from husbands, children from parents and the young stronger ones who could carry the families in labors were gone. Do you sometimes feel like you are one of those abandoned and left to fend for yourself? Do you feel like you are in exile? Or as we shall learn, do you

4 feel helpless as you watch two presidential candidates fight for the Presidency and you don t like either one of them. Well then this is the message for you. The preposition ad can also be translated as since or while. The translator chose to use the word as or till as this keeps with the flow of the poetic expression: As you grow old, I will remain the same. But it also carries the duel meaning, for those who are already old. I will remain the same is also tough to translate since it is literally translated as I am He. I know what you Hebrew students may be thinking. The I am He is YHWH, but it is not. It is simply I am He ani hu. So once the translators translated the Hebrew into I am He, they then had to explain what I am He means. The word He is hu which is a simple pronoun and can mean He, or it. It could also mean this or that. Davidson s lexicon adds same not as a definition but as a use. No doubt the writer intended for the reader to understand the pronoun to mean same but using the word Hu rather than sharah which is the proper word for same leaves us to conclude there is either a word play or something much deeper hidden in this verse. Maybe both. I believe the writer wanted to use the hu because the numerical value equals 12 which represents earthly governments. God is saying that you despair because your government is about to change but He is telling us to keep in mind that He has and always will be the ultimate earthly government. I find so many Christians in despair because they think Hillary is a crook Trump is bum. They are terrified of Trump, but Hillary s cute but does not speak their values. Every prayer meeting is filled with despair, Oh pray for our country, pray for our government, what shall we ever do? Don t get me wrong I pray daily for our nation, our

5 government and Trump and Hillary but I am not worry about it. I believe God is telling us in His Word that he really doesn t care who runs our earthly government or who is president, because He is our government. Whoever becomes President is under His domination. Did God really care who the Pharaoh was, He made short work of him when he defied God. The real danger is Christians who lose their faith in God s ability to control the nations. Remember what Isaiah said just a six chapters back? Isaiah 40:15 Behold, the nations [are] as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing. What did Paul say in II Timothy 1:7? For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Pray for the election, do what you can to vet the candidates, support your candidate and on November 11 vote for your candidate and sit back, sip your Iced Tea and enjoy the proceedings because no matter who wins, God will still be in control God sort of repeats Himself in this verse when He says When you grow gray, I will carry you. Again we have ad As you are gray Not too much to say about the word gray (sivah) except that it is in a feminine form. Gray is a symbol of innocence. However, tracing this word to its Semitic roots I found it was a picture of a home or nation being disrupted, turn upside down so to speak. When your home is shattered through divorce, separation, financial disaster, or like Judah during this time when husbands were separated from their wives and children and taken into slavery; the Lord said He will carry you when you have no spouse or parent to carry you.

6 Note the word carry or bear is esebol. It is in a simple qal future form. In other words He does not carry, but will carry. It is your choice. He will not automatically carry you, you must be willing to let Him carry you. The word sevol means to carry a burden, to be a porter. For the woman whose husbands were taken into exile, God promised to be their husbands, to provide for them, protect them, to carry the burden that their husbands would normally carry. As today for women who have been abandoned, divorced, separated, widowed, God promises to take their husband s place as the protector, the provider. For men who have lost their source of affection, the stability that a good wife brings and the comfort she can give her mate God promises to be their source of affection, stability and comfort when he loses his job or his health declines. Indeed the word sevol in its Semitic origin is Samek shelter for the next letter the if you will ask for it through the Lamed or Beth home prayer and receiving from heaven. God will be the shelter and provider for your home if you just ask and receive. He goes on to say that he is our maker asithi. He does not say creator bara. The creator creates the clay, the maker forms the vessel, fine tunes it to his desire and as a result he will not only esbol carry you but will emalet you or rescue you. Emalet is also used for cement or mortar. He will make you stable and secure. It is also in a piel form which means He will most surely be this for us. It is also in the imperfect form so again we must ask. You have not because you ask not. James 4:3