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Bible: Old Testament: English Standard Version
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The Steadfast Love of God
The Old Testament is a collection of books about God’s relationship with humanity (and in particular, with the people of Israel). The way that relationship is expressed is most commonly referred to with the Hebrew word hesed, which the ESV usually translates as “steadfast love.” This theme of the steadfast love of God courses through the entirety of the Old Testament and is one of the main elements that binds together all its disparate genres and styles.
Hesed has a more particular set of meanings than the English word “love” does, especially when applied as an attribute of God. It is related to the word for kindness (and in older translations was often rendered as “lovingkindness”), which indicates that the word does not primarily conceive of love as an affective emotion or an inner state of one’s own feelings, but as an active virtue which reaches out to practical effect in others’ lives. It also carries overtones of faithfulness and loyalty, and thus some English translations render it as “faithful love” or “covenant love.” Essentially, hesed is an active expression of love in the context of an established relationship of complete commitment between two parties. It carries with it a sense of mutual obligation, a binding of honor and loyalty to another person, which is expressed in perpetually seeking the other’s good.
While hesed was a normal cultural way of thinking about human relationships, especially within the bonds of families, one of the Old Testament’s most dramatic contributions to theology was to express the divine-human relationship in terms of hesed. God chooses to bind himself in covenant-relationships of mutual affection and obligation with human beings, even though his divine prerogative would not require him to do so. His act of love reflects his desire to enter into these relationships—he loves because he chooses to love, not because he must: In the words of Deuteronomy 7:7, “[…] the LORD set his love on you and chose you […]”. Further, God binds himself not just to affection or kindness toward his people, but to an ongoing commitment to continue his lovingkindness toward them, no matter what may happen in the future. This element, of the ongoing surety of God’s commitment to love, is shown in the ESV’s decision to translate hesed as “steadfast love” (emphasis added). God’s hesed toward his people even goes farther than most human relationships were expected to go. While there is a sense of mutual obligation in both the divine-human and the human-human relationships of hesed, the Old Testament regularly expresses God’s intention to maintain his hesed toward Israel even if Israel does not remain faithful to him: “For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed” (Isaiah 54:10). Within the Christian tradition, this core theme of God’s faithful love is sometimes described in terms of his “unconditional love,” meaning that God will love his people for no other reason or condition other than the fact that he has chosen to set his love on them. In what is one of the most often-repeated refrains in the whole Old Testament, this theme of God’s unchanging, steadfast love is affirmed: “For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever […]” (Psalm 100:5; see also 1 Chronicles 16:34; 2 Chronicles 5:13; 7:3; 20:21; Ezra 3:11; Psalms 106:1; 107:1; and Jeremiah 33:11).
The Steadfast Love of God is a theme that runs throughout the Old Testament, and it is seen most dramatically in the recurring narratives of Israel’s rebellions and failures to live up to the standards of God’s covenant-law. From the moment God delivers his law to Moses until the very end of the Old Testament accounts, the Israelites are locked in perpetual cycles of rebellion, disobedience, and tepidity in their faith. These failures to live faithfully run through all the historical books, leading to social and political catastrophes like the Assyrian and Babylonian invasions, and they also form the background content for most of the pleading rebukes delivered by the prophets. It should be noted that these failures to live faithfully are not attributed to any moral deficiency in the Israelites considered as a national or racial group; the assumption is that any other people group in the world would also fail to keep God’s covenant because of the problem of sin, which affects all humanity in equal measure. Yet despite Israel’s perpetual unfaithfulness, the faithfulness of God does not waver. He may allow Israel to live with the consequences of their sins and even chasten them with judgments to urge them back to the right way, but his steadfast love for them is never revoked. Over and over again, God plays the role of redeemer for his people, drawing them back to himself even after all their rebellions, thus underscoring the unchanging nature of his steadfast love.
The Problem of Sin
One of the major narrative arcs of the Old Testament is the story of how God seeks to deal with the problem of humanity’s sinfulness. While the Old Testament does not offer a full and precise definition of the concept of “sin” (mostly because it is such a ubiquitous theological idea that its meaning tends to be assumed), the Old Testament’s content generally addresses sin in the sense of falling short of God’s way. This is usually demonstrated in acts of disobedience to God’s commands.
The first sin of humanity is described in Genesis 3, in which Eve and Adam disobey God’s directive not to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The immediate effects of this act of rebellion are described in terms of death: “[…] in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:18). While Adam and Eve do not die immediately, the consequences of their sin appear to include both physical mortality and, perhaps even more importantly, spiritual “death” in the sense that they are cut off from God, the source of all life. In Christian tradition, this first experience of sin is referred to as “the fall,” and Christian theology teaches that this ancestral sin has left a lasting mark on the depths of human nature, making the problem of sin so intractable that humans cannot solve it without the redeeming grace of God. Expelled from their intimate union with God in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve must thereafter make a life for themselves in the wilderness outside. In the subsequent accounts of Earth’s primeval history, the problem of sin drives the narrative. As passing generations sink into ever greater depravity on account of their sins, God must intervene in human history with acts of judgment that curb the influence and extent of sin.
Once God establishes a covenant-relationship with the nation of Israel, the problem of sin takes center-stage once again. Because God is entirely holy, without any sin or imperfection or evil, there cannot be a real and intimate union between him and anyone who sins. This is a seemingly insurmountable problem, because sin is ubiquitous in the life and experience of the Israelites with whom God is undertaking the covenant. However, the theology of the Old Testament provides a partial solution: Since the consequence of sin is death (as expressed in the opening chapters of Genesis), then sin can be dealt with, at least temporarily, by providing a ritual death to cover a person’s sins and so bring atonement. Thus, a very large proportion of the law of Moses concerns the practice of offering animal sacrifices to God (human sacrifice would be inappropriate because it would constitute yet another sin). In many cases, these animal sacrifices are offered for the express purposes of dealing with sin and offering atonement. By securing this ritual atonement through the blood of the sacrifices, the Israelites are proclaimed ceremonially clean and thus able to enter into their communion of worship with God.
This system of animal sacrifice, enshrined in Israel’s temple, is necessarily temporary and incomplete. Sacrifices must be offered over and over again, and the question of how it makes sense that an animal could take the place of a human’s sin goes largely unanswered. Christian tradition answers that question by suggesting that the Old Testament pattern of animal sacrifice foreshadows the vicarious sacrifice which Jesus offers in his death on the cross, and it is only in Jesus’s sacrifice that the full and final atonement of human beings can be achieved. Christians hold that this doctrine is proclaimed in the prophecies of the Old Testament itself:
But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all (Isaiah 53:5-6).
Even with the temple system and its sacrifices in place, the problem of sin remains one of the overriding themes of the Old Testament. Both on a personal and a national level, Israelites continue to stumble into cycles of sin and rebellion against God. The Old Testament’s depictions of the kings of Israel and Judah, for example, focus their attention less on each king’s political accomplishments, and far more on their obedience or disobedience to God. The prophets, even well into the post-exilic period with which the Old Testament ends, must constantly warn and rebuke the people of Israel for their sins against God. Intriguingly, the Old Testament ends with the problem of sin still largely unresolved. A partial system is in place to deal with Israel’s sinfulness through the temple’s sacrifices, but it is clear that that system is not enough on its own to finally solve the problem of sin and separation from God which began with Adam and Eve.
Faithfulness to God’s Law
From the book of Exodus onward, the law of God (referred to as the Torah in Jewish tradition) occupies a predominant place in the religious content of the Old Testament. The law of God can be seen as part of the means by which the previous theme, The Problem of Sin, is addressed, but encompasses far more than just the ritual practice of animal sacrifice. The law of God extends to a full articulation of how Israelites are to live a good and holy life in the sight of God. If the sacrificial aspect of Israelite worship can be said to address the negative side of the equation—that is, how to atone for sins already committed—the theme of faithfulness to God’s law can be said to address the positive side: how to learn to walk in goodness and virtue, and so curtail sinfulness in one’s life from the start. In the Christian interpretation of the Old Testament, a distinction is often made between “case law”—the ritual observances which were meant to atone for sins and to keep Israelites ceremonially clean for their worship of God, seen by Christians as having been fulfilled in Jesus—and the “moral law” which is rooted in the holy attributes of God’s own character, and comprise necessary instructions for the Christian life. Among these moral laws are the Ten Commandments, as well as many others which instruct God’s people how to live uprightly.
The law of God is not portrayed as an onerous restriction for the Israelite people (though their sin does, at times, lead them to complain about it, a reaction which is uniformly rebuked throughout the Old Testament). Rather, the law is overwhelmingly portrayed as something good, a treasure of immense value that God has given to them. The law of God is a gift that perpetually underscores his steadfast love for them, offering them a way to live that will protect them from the worst consequences of sin’s depravity and the suffering it causes. The law of God is often spoken of in terms of wisdom and truth, reaffirming that it is seen not as a negative aspect of Israelite life, like the imposition of unwanted rules, but rather as a thoroughly positive aspect. The book of Psalms lavishes praise on the law:
The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; […] the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; […] the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold (Psalm 19:7-10).
This excerpt from Psalms suggests that faithfulness to God’s law should not proceed from a grudging sense of obligation, but rather from the fullness of love and joy derived from one’s relationship with God. This is evidenced, for example, in the life of David, whose sincere delight in God was the motivating power behind his attempts to walk according to God’s law. This sensibility is also reflected in one of the core passages of the Old Testament, called the Shema in Jewish tradition:
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart (Deuteronomy 6:4-6).
Faithfulness to the law of God is portrayed as a loving response to the great privilege of inheriting the gift of God’s wisdom and truth.
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