Sunday, February 21, 2010

Shalom!

Shalom must surely be one of the most common Hebrew words known around the world! It is pretty much the only Hebrew word I knew when I started an Interactive Hebrew class 2 weeks ago. My good friend Vonnie invited me, and I was eager to attend. The class is taught in a mixture of Hebrew and English. It's fun, informative, and challenging. I am such a reader, I love words, and am finding how much I rely on words to aid me in my learning. To be taught in another language, and pretty much solely by story telling, is to engage my brain in a challenge. I won't come out of the class as a Hebrew linguist, but I will have a new respect for the culture behind the language, the tradition of oral story telling, and the deeper meanings that come from a language other than English. Hebrew language doesn't have as many words as the English language, but the richness of the meanings of the words used adds a depth to their language that is missing from our language, especially in the ways that we write and speak today. When did we lose the richness of our language? I think we need to start a movement to bring it back!

As part of the class we are also reading a book called "Getting Involved With God: Rediscovering the Old Testament" by Ellen F. Davis. We won't be discussing the book (such torture), but it is meant to compliment our learning. We are only supposed to read the chapter assigned to us--whoever heard of such a thing! This is so hard for a person who greedily looks at the books people are reading and wants to snatch and grab them for herself. So, I guess I have to share what I found worth contemplating here. (I did however, notice a book the instructor had on the table called "In Praise of Slowness: Challenging the Cult of Speed" which I rushed right out to buy and am a third of the way through--I tell you, I am not lying when I say I am greedy for books!)

So, our assigned chapter was chapter 5: "Ive Got to Turn Aside: The Burning Bush". The author is making an association between the burning bush and the incarnation. This is what caught my attention:
"Mary, who carried God in her belly and later in her arms, yet did not dissolve to ash--she is herself the bush that burns perpetually, yet is not consumed. That image of Mary, ancient and still fresh, may serve to refresh our reading of Moses' story, which suffers somewhat from over-familiarity. Mary and Moses have this in common: in the history of the world, they are the two people who have known God most intimately, known God in ways that mortal flesh ordinarily could not tolerate without burning to a cinder. The Israelites understood that trespassing on holy ground would bring instant death. The high priest took his life in his hands when he entered the Holy of Holies one day each year, and even he entered the holy place enveloped in smoke, for who could see God and live? Yet God spoke to Moses "face to face, as one speaks to a friend" (Exodus 33:11)--in one place, scripture says "mouth-to-mouth" (Numbers 12:8).
I have never thought of Jesus birth in those terms before. It really is amazing, isn't it. In all the Bible stories before, it's true, the people could not see God, the High Priests had to follow specific rules or die. Yet God placed Jesus in Mary and she lived. It struck me that in a sense we are all like Mary now. God placed the Holy Spirit in us, we carry Him with us through and in everything we say and do. We do not die. We approach Him every day with no consequence other than Love. Even in our disobedience, He loves us. I loved the end of the chapter where the author says:
The flame that burned in the bush at Sinai is the same light to which Mary give birth. It burns yet, and, for all our darkness, is not extinguished. We are in Epiphany, the season of light. Come then, "take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you are standing, it's holy ground".