P'nei Adonai resources for walking in the presence of God
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P'nei Adonai resources for walking in the presence of God
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Hebrew concepts • amen • anah • asham • avodah • BS"D • eved • kana • machaseh • minchah • mishpochah • ol Yeshua • olah • pesookay d'zeemrah • shachah • teshuvah • yirat Adonai Biblical Greek concepts • baptizo • douleuo • latreuo • diakoneo Modern concepts • kosher (Not all of our vocabulary notes have yet been transferred from our old website's format. Sorry for the inconvenience. Please check back later.)
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Avodah
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| And Ezri the son of K'loov was over the doing of the profession of the field [farming] to labor in the earth. |
Similarly, doing your profession need not be laborious. Numbers 8:26 says the Levites over fifty should still sharath ("minister") but no longer "do the labor of labor".
When capitalized, the word Avodah refers the seventeenth blessing of the Amdiah, which asks God to restore the Temple with its Levitical labors and to accept prayer as the labor of all Israel.
But the Tenach does not include many narratives of people going about their daily work to earn a living, and thus focuses on a few kinds avodah:
Money collected to help build or run the Tabernacle or Temple was said to be for labor (Exodus 30:16, Nehemiah 10:32).
The Levites are the ones who labor in the Tabernacle (Exodus 38:21, Numbers 3:7-8, 8:11, 8:24-26 etc.) They do so by being assigned a masa ("lifting burden") to do (Numbers 4:49). Numbers 18:5-7 twice calls this Levitical opportunity to labor is a gift.
This Levitical labor is not slavery done without wages. The Israelite's tithes are the Levite's payment (Numbers 18:20-24). In these verses, describing the aftermath of the Korach rebellion, the Levites are told they do not own property because someone who owns property now "bears sin" if they enter the sanctuary and will die, but they lack property and can "bear iniquity" and live.
What labor did the Levites do? We know mostly about what they did after King David reorganized the Levitical duties. In First Chronicles (verses 23:24-32, 25:1-5 and 28:15) and Second Chronicles (verses 8:14, 29:34-35, 35:2-11) we read of Levites who purify items, prophesy without instruments, who prophesy with instruments (harp, lyre, and cymbals), who play the horn, who use the Temple vessels, who are porters, who are teachers, and who help the Cohenim process the sacrifes when need arises. First Chronicles 23:28 implies this last duty was frequently done by Levites, but was not normally considered to be their labor.
Because of Isaiah 43:23-24 and the fact that keeping Pesach (the only time most Israelites sacrificed an animal themselves) is considered a kind of labor, it is reasonable to assume the kind of "worship" referred to by avad is performing animal sacrifice. (Surely Adonai would not want his people praying to an idol or singing songs of praise to it, but these activities do not seem to be considered avodah in either context of Tabernacle use or idolatry.)
As an example of how "worship" and "labor for" can be synonymous, consider Exodus 3:12, in which God speaks to Moshe and says...
| This will be the sign for you that I have sent you, for I am with you! In your bringing forth the people out of Egypt you will labor for (ta'avdoon) God on this mountain. |
God repeatedly has Moshe tell Pharaoh "Let my people go that they may labor for me (ya'avdoonee)" (Exodus 4:23 [using 'my son' instead of 'my people'], 7:16, 8:1, 8:20, 9:1, 9:13, 10:3, 10:7-11, 10:24-26, and 12:31).
Exodus 23:25 also uses avad to mean "labor for" or "worship" Adonai, perhaps referring to both animal offerings and Torah obedience.
The second commandment says not to "labor for" idols (Exodus 20:5, Deuteronomy 5:9), as does Exodus 23:24,33, Deuteronomy 7:4, 7:16, 8:19, and many other verses in Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, etc.
Demons want us to labor for them with sacrifices (Deuteronomy 32:17, Psalm 106:37, First Corinthians 10:20).
By the First Century "labor" also referred to good or evil deeds (Matthew 5:16, 23:3, etc.), a task given to someone by God (John 4:34, 6:29, etc.), and the combination of fasting and prayer (Luke 2:37).
The Apostle Paul adds that proclaiming the Good News is laboring for Adonai (Romans 1:9), as is bringing forth fruitful obedience in newness of spirit (Romans 7:4-6, 25). Paul also adds that obedience to Torah is fully compatible with laboring for Adonai (Acts 24:14).
In the Talmud the word avodah retains its original meanings, and also is at times used to refer specifically to the entirety of Yom Kippur's rituals and ceremonies. This idiom may have been in use in the first century.
| And whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord, and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you wait upon (douleuo, not ergon) the Lord Messiah. |
The verb douleuo means to wait on, as a waiter at a fancy restaurant does, who spends most of his time patiently waiting until a glass needs refilling or a dish needs clearing.
Properly interpreted, Colossians 3:23-24 asks us to treat our occupational labors as something to do as we wait for the chance to labor for God. It is not claiming our occupational labors are laboring for God. A constant focus on God and readiness to serve him is what makes daily life worshipful.
Related to this is Yesuha's warning that we revere God in vain if we think man-made doctrines are divine truth (Matthew 15:9 and Mark 7:7). Comparing Yeshua's words to Isaiah 29:13 makes explicit how such confusion renders our reverence impotent: the confused doctrines ruin our yirat Adonai so we end up praising God with a heart that does not understand or love him.
Yeshua similarly taught that "true people who bow down shall bow down to God in spirit and in truth" (John 4:20-26). This phrase is difficult: how does a person bow down "in spirit and truth"? At the very least, this must again mean keeping our yirat Adonai genuine by avoiding false understandings of whom we bow down before. (For a longer discussion please refer to the vocabulary essay on shachah.)
What can we do with God to help him or ourselves? Along with Job (verse 21:15), we must ask
| What is the Almighty, that we should labor for him? What profit should we have, if we meet with him? |
To answer this question outside of the context of Tabernacle use we should consider several very similar generalizations given in Deuteronomy to all the Israelites, not just the Levites (verses 6:13, 10:12, 10:20, 11:13, 13:4).
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To Adonai your God, you shall fear him and labor (ta'avod), and by his name swear. And now, Israel, what does Adonai your God ask of you, but to fear Adonai your God, to walk in all his ways, and to love Him, and to labor for (la'avod) Adonai your God with all your heart and with all your soul. To Adonai your God, you shall fear him and labor (ta'avod), and come hold fast, and by his name swear. ...to love Adonai your God, and labor for him with all your heart and all your soul... After Adonai your God you shall walk, and fear him, and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and labor for him and come hold fast. |
The context of all these verses is hearing and obeying God's commandments and instructions. Both in context and in grammatical parallelism, "laboring for God" is equated with listening to and obeying what God tells us. Other verses later in the Tenach are similar (First Samuel 12:14, Malachi 3:14-18, etc.).
Yeshua commented on this (Matthew 4:10) and later expounded that since his own teaching was divinely revealed interpretation of Torah then obeying it was also laboring for God (John 14:15 and 15:4).
| If you love me, keep my commandments... Remain in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it remains in the vine, so neither can you, unless you remain in me. |
In other words, following him was laboring for Adonai (John 12:26).
| If anyone serves me, let him follow me. Where I am, there will my servant also be. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. |
Summarizing all we have observed so far, we can currently, without a Temple, labor for God through:
Zepheniah 3:9 puts forth the goal of laboring for Adonai "shoulder to shoulder" (literally "united neck"). Our labor should be cooperative and communal.
In Deuteronomy 28:47 we are told to labor for Adonai "with rejoicing and goodness of heart". Psalm 100:2 asks us to labor for Adonai "with rejoicing". Why do we have joy? Because when we labor for God properly we can be near him and hold fast to him.
Furthermore, we can have even more joy because we can labor for God without fear (Luke 1:74) since we are cleansed from the evil inclination (Hebrews 9:9-14, 10:2). Yet our freedom from fear when approaching God does not mean we may grow careless: our labor for Adonai should still be done with modesty and caution (Hebrews 12:28).
Finally, scripture warns us that doing too much occupational labor may cause us to not hear others, including God. In Exodus 6:9 people do not hear because of their labor, in contrast to Exodus 2:23 when God hears the Israelites because of their labor.
Interestingly, when we are disobedient and God must "labor with our sins" (Isaiah 43:23-24). Perhaps this now refers Yeshua's continuing intercession for us (First John 2:1).
