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Tidbits

by Tim O'Hearn

Sometimes a thought comes to mind that is not really enough for a full article. Sometimes it may be worthy of an article full of short pieces, such as in my earlier articles entitled Musings. (Minutes With Messiah July 2000 and August 2006) This time I think I will just call them tidbits.
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When confronted by God at the burning bush, Moses made the excuse that he was “slow of speech and slow of tongue.” (Ex 4:10) God replied that he could make him speak well. When Moses further pleaded for God to send someone else, God replied that Aaron was coming to meet Moses, and He knew Aaron could speak well. Some have taken this to mean that Moses had a speech impediment, perhaps a stutter. If so, it is amazing that this man who could not speak well could, at the end of his life forty years later, deliver the oration that is the majority of the book of Exodus. Several things come to mind. First, God could have healed Moses’ impediment during the forty years; but why not do so immediately? Second, Moses was just making an excuse; but God responded as if it was a legitimate argument. Third, Moses spent fortyWouldn’t it be easier to love everyone so that you don’t have to suddenly change your mind about them? years speaking Egyptian, and another forty speaking Midianite. Perhaps in the final forty he learned to be fluent in Hebrew, rather than speaking it haltingly. In German I am also slow of speech, but after six months of immersion training I would probably speak almost like a native; so it may have been with Moses. But then, why did Aaron have to speak before Pharaoh? Egyptian was Moses’ heart language. Maybe there is another answer. Regardless of which you accept, God still was able to take a man who thought he wasn’t a good speaker and make him a great one. We, then, should not use this as an excuse for not teaching others the gospel.
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In Genesis 29, Jacob sought the hand of Rachel in marriage. He agreed to work seven years for her. When the time came, Laban substituted Leah for Rachel. (Some rabbis say that Rachel had a part in this deception.) When Jacob complained, Laban said, “Fulfil her week, and we will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve with me yet seven other years.” (Gen 29:27) So Jacob worked another seven years for Rachel, but with a difference. The first seven years came before the marriage (to Leah in Rachel’s place), but the second seven years came after he married Rachel. Why? Did Laban not trust this stranger, although a kinsman, after just meeting him, but changed his mind after seven years?
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Speaking of Leah, she was said to have had “weak [or tender or infirm] eyes.” Nobody is sure what this means. It is not likely that it meant nearsightedness, unless that gave her a perpetual squint. Otherwise her eyes would not have been contrasted with Rachel’s beauty. Whatever it meant, David had the opposite characteristic. In 1 Samuel 16:12, David is described as having a “beautiful countenance,” which would literally be translated as “fair eyes.” Whatever Leah’s eyes lacked, David’s made up for it.
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Bigotry is not new. Joseph’s brothers went down to Egypt for food during a famine. On their second trip down, Joseph (now the Prime Minister of Egypt) invited them to dinner.

And they set on for him by himself, and for them by themselves, and for the Egyptians, which did eat with him, by themselves: because the Egyptians might not eat bread with the Hebrews; for that is an abomination unto the Egyptians. (Gen 43:32)

The Egyptians would not eat with the Hebrews, but the joke was on them. They had been eating with a Hebrew (Joseph) for at least eight years. And that is the way of bigotry. In the words of Oscar Hammerstein II, “You have to be carefully taught.” And even then you cannot always tell. Color of skin is not a reliable indicator of whom to hate; there are many who can “pass.” If the bigotry is with some other characteristic, it is likewise hard to tell. Is he gay or not? Is he Jewish or not? Is he a Republican [or Democrat] or not? Many were the citizens of 1930s Germany who were friendly with their neighbors until the day that they were exposed as “Juden.” Wouldn’t it be easier to love everyone, regardless of distinction, so that you don’t have to suddenly change your mind about them?
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Did you ever wonder who baptized the apostles? Or even how they baptized thousands in one day? With the apostles it may be that God baptized them. “For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.” (Acts 1:5) It may be that the baptism with the Holy Spirit was sufficient in their case. On the other hand, Cornelius (Acts 10) had the same baptism with the Spirit as they had, but he still had to be immersed for forgiveness of sins. Another possibility: the apostles baptized each other. The command is to be immersed, and so it seems irrelevant who administers it as long as the one being baptized acknowledges that it is for forgiveness of sins. (Acts 2:38) So it may be that one apostle baptized another, then that one baptized the others. But what about the 3,000? Could 12 men immerse that many people in one day? Even if the immersion was administered only by those who had faith in Jesus as the Messiah, which is likely, it could have been exponential rather than linear. That is, twelve apostles baptize twelve people. Those 24 (twelve plus twelve) baptize 24. Then 48. At that rate, it would only take eight rounds of baptisms to reach the 3,000 number. And that is assuming a one-on-one ratio. It may be that several people were immersed at once by on person witnessing it. But where would they find that much water in Jerusalem, away from any river? These were Jews. Immersion was already a part of their culture, and so they had mikvot already prepared. After all, on any given day one-thirtieth of the female population and possibly that proportion of males or more required ritual cleansing. There had to have been hundreds of places in town where multiple people could be immersed.
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The other day I was reading The Mother Tongue, Bill Bryson’s book about the development of the English language. He devotes an early chapter to the development of language in general. Linguistics as a science is barely 200 years old. In the late 18th century, someone noted similarities between languages. This led to the classification into language groups, such as Indo-European, Athabascan, and Dravidian. Some languages defied classification. For instance, it was long believed that the Basque language of the western Pyrenees was unique, with no relatives. That alone made linguists scratch their heads. But then it was determined that Basque is related to a language of southern India. How could two related languages exist in two widely-separated areas of the world, with no possible link between them? Linguists have long had a dream of finding a single, original language. Various theories have been put forth with disparaging names such as the bow-wow, ding-dong, or ta-ta theories. Linguists tend to pooh-pooh (also the name of a theory) the oldest and best-known theory of how languages developed or diversified.

And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth. (Gen 11:6-9)

This was the one-language theory long before any other. Whether that original language was Proto-Indo-European, Chaldean, or something entirely lost to history is irrelevant. One might even name this theory the Babel theory or the Tower theory. How about just the God theory?
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Descriptive words or phrases. We all use them, and probably have our favorites. Sly as a fox. Dumber than a pile of bricks. Beautiful as a New Mexico sunset. (That last one, knowing that no other sunset except maybe one at sea can compare.) Sometimes these descriptions are repetitions of an old cliché. At other times we make up our descriptions based on personal experience. Moses was notThe command is to be immersed, and so it seems irrelevant who administers it. immune to this practice. When he wrote about Lot’s choice of land to settle, one wonders if he makes reference to a favorite place as a descriptor.

And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest unto Zoar. (Gen 13:10)

Zoar, in reference to a town on the Plain of Jordan, appears several times in the Bible. That Zoar does not fit Moses’ description of an Egyptian town. Most Egyptian towns were not “well-watered,” but as an Egyptian prince Moses had probably spent a considerable time in the Nile delta. Maybe Zoar was his favorite summer palace, although we have no record of such a place. No record, anyway, except in a descriptive phrase for a fair land, comparing it even with the Garden of Eden.
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I have a bunch of other notes that may or may not turn into articles. Some of them are casual thoughts like these. As you read the Bible, take note of unusual phrases or verses. Some of them may just be a nice turn of phrase. Others may raise questions. Some of those may lead to deeper research, but others may just be tidbits of knowledge to be stored up and pondered on. Just because it is not worth writing a doctoral thesis about does not make it any less interesting. In fact, just that they make you ponder makes them tidbits worth noticing. After all, a nibble of chocolate tastes just as good as a bite.