The mercy and the truth of God involve two at least of the most important words in the Old Testament, and indeed in the whole Bible. Micah’s: “Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn into our fathers from the days of old” (7:20), delivered as a triumphant conclusion to his prophecy and as a declaration of the fulfilment of the purpose of God, is paralleled in the New Testament by the apostle Paul’s: “For I say that Christ hath been made a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, that he might confirm the promises given unto the fathers, and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy” (Rom 15:8–9). It is evident that to understand what the apostle Paul has in mind, it is essential to know what truth and mercy meant to Micah and his fellow prophets.
The mercy and compassion of God are the subject of an abundance of passages in the Old Testament; a number of words are being used, however, and their meanings mostly correspond to the English renderings, but sometimes not. Three of them occur in the declaration of Yahweh’s Name: “The Lord . . . full of compassion and gracious, slow to anger and plenteous in mercy and truth . . .” (Exod 34:6). The terms compassion, gracious and mercy are those which we must consider first. The AV, by translating the last three words of the quotation “goodness and truth” tends to give a wrong impression and to obscure the fact that the word rendered “goodness” is the same as that rendered “mercy” in the next phrase, “keeping mercy for thousands”.
Significant Terms
The word chēn (pronounced “Chayn” with chas in Scottish “loch”) is the root of the word “gracious” above and is usually rendered quite correctly as grace or favour. “Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord” suggests the favour of a superior to an inferior, implying that the favour is unmerited. It appears as a verb in a case like that of Psalm 25:6: “Turn thee unto me and have mercy upon me”, where the psalmist is really saying: Be gracious unto me; as again in Psalm 26:11: “Redeem me and be merciful unto me.” The first aspect of the divine mercy, then, is grace of favour.
The term rendered “full of compassion” in Exodus 34:6 comes from a root racham, to have tender feelings, as a mother for her child, and is usually translated mercy, tender mercies, or compassion; as in Psalm 25:6: “Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies . . .” It appears as a verb in Psalm 103:13: “Like as a father pitieth his children . . .”, while Isaiah 49:15 shows that the comparison between a mother’s feelings for her child and the mercy of God to Israel is not a forced one: “Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, these may forget, yet will not I forget thee”—where the root for having compassion is the same as that rendered frequently tender mercies. The idea that the Almighty could be capable of such feelings may seem strange to us at first, but as we shall have reason to see it is not an uncommon one in the Old Testament.
Steadfast Love
The third, and probably most significant word of all is chesed, usually rendered mercy, goodness or kindness; but these renderings have come about mostly because the Greek LXX and the Latin Vulgate both translated it by words which really mean pity (eleos, misericordia) and do not therefore distinguish it from the two already considered, chēn and racham. Chesed is, however, a most distinctive word, whose right understanding adds greatly to the value of Old Testament passages where it occurs. It seems to have had a primitive idea of strength, as in Isaiah 40:6: “All flesh is grass, and all the chesed thereof is as the flower of the field”; that is, all the firmness or strength. By contrast the word of the Lord endureth for ever.
Applied to relationships between individuals it means faithfulness, loyalty, especially to a covenant already entered into. In this sense it may be illustrated from purely human alliances: “I will show kindness (chesed) unto Hanan the son of Nahash, as his father showed kindness unto me”; that is, said David, I will be loyal in my alliance with the son as his father was to me (2 Sam 10:2). When Hushai, David’s friend, came to salute the rebel Absalom, crying, “God save the king”, Absalom retorted: “Is this thy chesed to thy friend?” meaning not kindness as the AV would suggest, but loyalty and faithfulness to one with whom Hushai was in close relationship (2 Sam 16–17). Jonathan, knowing that the succession on the throne of Israel was reserved by God for David, knowing too that in such circumstances the accession of the new king was practically a sentence of death upon the heir of the former one, solemnly adjures his friend: “Thou shalt not only while I live show me the chesed of the Lord, that I die not: but also thou shalt not cut off thy chesed from my house for ever . . .” (1 Sam 20:14–15). It was a plea that David would remain loyal to his friend. Jonathan’s remarkable expression “the chesed of the Lord” suggests that this loyalty originates with God, and so it proves.
Jacob, “greatly afraid” at the prospect of meeting the company of Esau, prays to God, thanking Him for all the “mercies (chesed) and the truth” he has received: he means that God has been faithful to the covenant made with his father Abraham. Moses, in his song of rejoicing after the deliverance from Egypt, declares: “Thou in thy mercy (chesed) hast led forth the people which thou hast redeemed” (Exod 15:13). God had not abandoned His people to their bondage, but as He said to Moses: “I have remembered my covenant.” So to the essential element of loyalty in chesed there is added a very real element of love and pity, a fact which the RSV recognizes by its rendering “steadfast love”. That the sense of loyalty to a covenant is, however, fundamental to chesed is indicated by the number of times in which it is found in parallel with the word covenant itself: “Know therefore”, says Moses, “that the Lord thy God . . . is the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy” (Deut 7:9); and to the redeemed remnant God gives assurance: “My kindness (chesed) shall not depart from thee, neither shall my covenant of peace be removed . . .” (Isa. 54:10). In fact the modern scholar C H Dodd asserts: “Chesed is not used indiscriminately . . . (but) only where there is some recognized tie. It is the very opposite of chēn” (The Bible and the Greeks, page 60, footnote).
Marriage as a Type
In Old Testament times it was marriage which best illustrated in human experience the divine chesed. In the Middle East, as indeed elsewhere, the future bride had little choice as to the man who was to become her husband; for it was he who took the initiative, choosing her first as one who would make a desirable wife, and approaching her father to get his consent. From the beginning of their relationship, therefore, it was the wife who had received grace and favour and was being offered the loyal love (so chesed) of her husband; in return the Eastern wife owed humble love, and loyalty, which was her chesed. It was this clear conception of the relationship in marriage which made it possible for God to use the figure so boldly to illustrate His own tie with Israel: “Thy maker is thine husband . . . The Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken . . .”; “I will betroth thee unto me . . .” (Isa 54:5; Hosea 2:19).
Naturally such an important word as chesed, appearing regularly in all the Old Testament writings from Moses to the last of the prophets, takes on overtones which enrich its sense. When used of God, it moves towards grace, for had He not chosen the fathers of Israel, redeemed the whole people by His own arm, received them into covenant relationship with Himself so that they had become His peculiar treasure? Equally important, however, is the firm resolve of God, in His chesed for Israel, to be utterly faithful to the covenant He has made with them. Snaith, in his book Distinctive Ideas of the OT, calculates that chesed is linked with another noun 43 times, of which no fewer than 23 are with emeth, usually rendered truth in the AV but really meaning faithfulness, firmness; and seven with berith, covenant. Psalm 89:33–34: “. . . My mercy (chesed) will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness (emeth) to fail. My covenant (berith) will I not break” is an example of this association. Snaith calculates that of 60 occurrences of chesed, no fewer than 48 are associated in some way with the idea of keeping faith, and only nine directly with that of kindness.
“Everlasting Love”
But the aspect of the love of God for Israel, shown in His covenant loyalty to them in spite of their sins, is very striking. His choice of their fathers in the first place and His redemption were founded upon His love. “Because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers”, says Moses (Deut 7:8), using the noun ahabah, love; and repeating it in its verb form in verse 13: “. . . If ye hearken to these judgments, and keep and do them, the Lord thy God shall keep with thee the covenant (berith) and the mercy (chesed) which he sware unto thy fathers, and he will love thee (ahab).” The same association between God’s love and His covenant loyalty is found in Jeremiah 31:3 in words addressed to the “virgin of Israel”: “I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness (chesed) have I drawn thee” . . . “therefore have I continued my faithfulness unto thee.” So it would appear that the love (ahabah) of God was the cause of the covenant, but His faithfulness (chesed) was the means of its continuance.
This love of God is shown in its intensity in the expression of His most tender feelings, even for Israel in their waywardness. “I will betroth thee unto me . . . in lovingkindness (chesed) and in mercies” (rachamim, the tender feelings of a mother for her child) (Hosea 2:19). Hosea 11 is very striking in this respect: “When Israel was a child, then I loved him: . . . I taught Ephraim to go; I took them on my arms” (the figure is that of a father teaching his young son to walk); “I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love.” Then, reflecting on the “backsliding” of His people, who “refused to return”, God continues through His prophet: “How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? (that is, how shall I deliver thee up to a judgment like that of Sodom and Gomorrah?) Mine heart is turned within me, my compassions are kindled together” (verses 1–11). The astonishing nature of this last expression as applied to God Himself, and by Himself, is revealed when it is realized that in the account of the meeting of Joseph with Benjamin, “his mother’s son”, in Egypt, where it is written that “his bowels did yearn upon his brother: and he sought where to weep”, the same expression is used; as indeed it is in the episode of the two women before Solomon, where of the real mother of the child it is written: “Her bowels yearned upon her son” (Genesis 43:30; 1 Kings 3:26). This expression of the real emotion of God, like indeed many other passages both in the Old Testament and the New, is a warning to us not to take the familiar “He willeth not that any should perish” in too coldly intellectual a sense. That we may have difficulty in understanding how God who knows the outcome of all things before they happen can react in this way is surely due to the limitations of our human minds. That He does so react is evident from His own testimony concerning Himself; and the light which this throws upon what our own attitude should be towards those who are erring is searching indeed.
Israel’s “Chesed”
As chesed when used of God means His loving faithfulness to His covenant people, so when used of the Israelite it signifies his faithful worship in humble reverence. Israel are exhorted not to “turn aside” nor to “forsake” God, but rather to “cleave unto” Him. So their chesed emerges as reverent devotion to His revealed commandments. In Jeremiah 2:2 God remembers the early willingness of the nation to serve Him as expressed in their thrice repeated: “All that the Lord hath spoken will we do”, by the following allusion: “I remember for thee the kindness (chesed) of thy youth . . . when thou wentest after me in the wilderness”, that is to say: I remember your youthful faithfulness to the covenant. In later times of apostasy He tells them through Hosea: “Your goodness (chesed) is as a morning cloud”, that is, your loyalty to me is dissipated as swiftly as the morning mists by the rising sun. Again in 2 Chronicles 32:32 it is said of Hezekiah: “. . . His good deeds (the plural of chesed) are written in the vision of Isaiah the prophet”, an allusion not so much to the moral quality of his life as to his acts of faithful obedience and worship.
Moral Demands
But the striking effect of God’s chesed towards the Israelite is shown in the demand which it makes, not only for humble and reverent service of God, but for a right attitude towards his fellows. Here Leviticus 19 is a passage of great power: “Ye shall be holy, for I Yahweh your Elohim am holy”; and the way in which the Israelites were to adopt the holiness of their God is shown in detail in the commands which follow. They were obviously to avoid certain idolatrous and immoral practices, but equally binding was the command to act in mercy one to another. They were deliberately to leave gleanings of their fields or of their vineyards for the “poor and stranger”: they were at all times to act in honesty and consideration one for another: the wages of a hired servant were to be paid the same day, the deaf were not to be cursed and the blind were not to be obstructed (that is, the helpless were not to be abused). In words which breathe the very spirit of the Sermon on the Mount, they were told: “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart . . . Thou shalt not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the Lord.” The key to the whole of this most searching demand upon the service of the Israelite’s heart and mind is found in verses 33–34: “. . . If a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not do him wrong . . . (He) shall be unto you as the home-born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” The implication of the words emphasized is very striking. Remember, says God to His people, that you were helpless slaves in bondage in Egypt and in My mercy (chesed) I redeemed you; because you have so received my mercy you must show the same to your brother Israelites and even to the foreigner living among you. This will be your chesed towards Me.
So faithfulness becomes mercy; the Israelite’s reverent obedience to the will of Yahweh leads him to act with kindness and uprightness to all with whom he came into contact. How remarkably similar are the obligations of the servant of God in Christ! For he too has been redeemed from a bondage out of which he was powerless to free himself: the bondage of sin; and because he has so received grace, he is constrained to act in love to his fellows: “Be ye kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. Be ye therefore imitators of God, as beloved children, and walk in love”: a love which is not humanitarian, nor sentimental, nor just a general disposition to be helpful, but is the solemn recognition of a deep obligation to extend mercy to others because of mercy received from God. Thus are the bases of the spiritual worship of God in both Old and New Testaments revealed to be identical. And how should it be otherwise, for the God of Israel and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ are one and the same!
“The Saints”
So the Israelite who remains faithful to God in reverent service and in his obligations to his fellows is chasid, which is the adjective and noun from chesed and is usually translated in our AV “the godly” or “the saints”. “O love the Lord, all ye his saints”, alludes not so much to their separateness or to the moral quality of their life, though these are necessary consequences, but to their steadfast devotion: as the next line adds: “for the Lord preserveth the faithful” (Psa 31:23). “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints”, and the psalmist, as one of the saints, proceeds to describe his own attitude: “I am thy servant . . . I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the name of the Lord” (Psa 116:15–17). The chasid is then one who acknowledges the chesed of God towards him and responds in humble and loving obedience. So in Psalm 16, the “holy one” (chasid) who will not be allowed to see corruption is one who trusts in the Lord (verse 1), worships Him only, regards Him as his true inheritance and portion (verses 2, 5), thanks God for His correction (verse 7), and sets the Lord always before him and knows that He is at his right hand. This is why he is God’s chasid, utterly devoted to His service, and why the Holy Spirit in the New Testament is able to point to the complete unfolding of the significance of this psalm in the person of the Son of God himself.
Vital then to the “mercy” of the Israelite as to the “love” of the Christian is their knowledge of the God who redeemed them, their reverent and faithful obedience to His revealed will for them, their careful acceptance both of the obligations of worship and of the merciful kindness required of them in their dealings with one another. In this way their life of love, far from being just the expression of a spiritual standard, is itself an act of deepest worship to the God who has redeemed them.