Wednesday, October 31, 2007

The Right of Naming

A man had a vision in which God visited him.

God said to the man, “In the beginning, I named Adam. Then I told Adam to name all the plants and animals. Today a father names his child, and a child names his dog.

“Until the child names it, that dog is merely a dog. But once named, it is the child’s dog. Until a baby is named by its father, it is merely a baby. But once named, the father has stamped the child as his.

“In the same way, I have named you, for you are mine. The name your father gave you is your earthly name, but that is not the name I gave you. Nor is your father’s earthly name the one that I gave to him.”

Then the man said to God, “Tell me my name, Lord.”

But God replied, “I will tell no one the name that I have given to them until men stop trying to name Me. For I do not belong to men. All of their names…Allah, God, Yahweh…are intended to possess Me. But I cannot be possessed. Even Moses wanted to know my name so that he too might possess Me. But I told him, ‘I AM who I AM.’ No man on earth and no angel in heaven can ever possess Me.

“Be at peace and know that I have named you. Do not worry about your name, and do not worry about My name. For both will be made known to you at the end.”

Be possessed by Him, but do not try to possess Him.

5 comments:

Falantedios said...

Interesting!

What do you make of Exodus 34:5-7?

Nick

Kyle said...

Good reference, Nick! Exodus 34:5 is the key to your question. It says, "Then the LORD came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the LORD."

I am not suggesting that God has never told mankind His name, but I am merely stating that we try so hard to make God our own. Through the years, we have called Him, El-Shaddai, Yahweh, YHWH, God, Lord, Allah, and many, many, many other names that do not come to mind right away.

All speak of the one true God. But we all act as if we own that name, and by owning that name, we own strict rights to being the "right" religion.

When we try to possess God for ourselves, we are arrogant. This is my point.

But now I'll digress a bit. I know that there are arguments about other things too. And this post (plus this comment) could be conceived as pretty controversial, since I am a Christian and it is coming off saying that maybe we're not the only "right" religion.

However, Jesus himself tells us that if we forget everything else there are two guiding principles that will always lead us in the right direction.

Matthew 22:36-40: "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

So a secondary point that I make here (and in some parables) is, 'Stop worrying about minutiae and arguing over who's right about little stuff. Start focusing on what is the most important thing...worshiping God!'

Falantedios said...

See, I read it as the WHOLE PASSAGE is the name he is proclaiming. It is a name so vast that we struggle to comprehend it as a name.

I agree with everything you've said. It is not we who possess God, but God who possesses us. Paul makes this particular point in Galatians 4:8-9 and 1 Cor 8:1-3. It is God knowing US that matters, not what we know.

in HIS love,
Nick

Kyle said...

That's interesting. I didn't get that the first time. So you're saying that verse 5 is the action, but verses 6 & 7 are the entire name of the Lord?

5 Then the LORD came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the LORD. 6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, "The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation."

Falantedios said...

That's what I think. We think of names as one short blurb that labels us as us.

I think that is kind of a nickname, a short version of who we are and who God is, and that this passage is God offering is whole identity to the Jews, and thus to us as well, to do with as we choose. I think this is a huge difference from the cultures surrounding the Hebrews. They, and the Hebrews too probably, believed that possessing something's real name gave you real power over that thing.

Our God says, "Here, take my name! I give it to you." Something completely different from the other religions.

Nick