Good and Bad
From the time I brought your ancestors up from Egypt until today, I warned them again and again, saying, “Obey me.” But they did not listen or pay attention; instead, they followed the stubbornness of their evil hearts. So I brought on them all the curses of the covenant I had commanded them to follow but that they did not keep. … Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape. Although they cry out to me, I will not listen to them.
Jeremiah 11:7-8, 11
I’ve been mentioning little-used Hebrew words in my recent posts. Today I’m going to take the opposite approach, looking at a some common, related words: רָ֑ע (ra, adjective) and רָעָ֔ה (ra’ah – noun). They are used hundreds of times throughout the Bible. They are used throughout Jeremiah, including this week’s chapter. Just taking the couple verses quoted above, each appears, translated as “evil” (adjective) and the second as “disaster” (noun). We could pick a single English word to translate i: “bad”, either as a description (adjective) or as the thing itself (noun). Ra has a large range of meaning, from something uncomfortable to some great malady.
The opposite is טֽוֹב (tov – good). This is how God describes the world is creates in Genesis 1. This is how God himself is described. It describes the way things are supposed to be.
These two opposing words meet each other in Genesis 2 with “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (ra) (Genesis 2:9). God created this world as good and has given us the choice whether to pursue good or bad. Unfortunately, our bad choices (sins) have led to bad results. Even our good God can send bad (disaster), as Jeremiah predicted. That doesn’t mean everything bad is from the Lord, but nothing good or bad has caught him by surprise, nor does it mean he has abandoned us.
To Ponder…
- Do I believe that God is good, despite the circumstances?
- Will I heed the Lord’s instruction, pursuing “good” rather than “bad”?