Good Morning Yamon Ki Yesepar and Nevim Arith Hayomim;

Psalms 36:12: “Let not the foot of pride overtake me.” 

“I am very proud to be called a pig.  It stands for pride, integrity and guts.”  Ronald Reagan

One reason why so many people liked Ronald Reagan was that he could be intelligent without being an intellectual.  His above acronym is a perfect example. 

Speaking of acronyms, did I ever tell you that the ancient Jewish sages loved acronyms?   They would often take a verse like Psalms 36:12 and turn it into an acronym.   The verse in the Hebrew is made up of four words: “al tevo’eni  regel ga’avah”   Take the first letter of each word  ‘ =  aelph,  t = taw, r = resh, and g = gimmel.   This would create the word “etrog.”   Etrog is an acronym for  “Let not the foot of pride overtake me.” 

Etrog is the Hebrew word for “citron” which is a lemon like citrus fruit grown in the Middle East .   The citron is the chief symbol of the Sukkoth – Feast of Tabernacles.  My study partner and I watched an Israeli movie about a Rabbi and his wife who were trying to celebrate the Sukkoth and yet were very poor.   When God allowed them to come into a small fortune the man took a great portion of that money to purchase the most perfect citron available to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles. This citron proved to play an important role in the message of the movie. To be suitable  a citron that is used in the Sukkoth must be complete, whole, and totally without blemish.  This completeness is expressed in another acronym for etrog which is emunah (faith), teshuvah (repentance), rephah (healing) and ge’ulah  (redemption).  David fears pride for pride will stand in the way of faith, repentance, healing and redemption. Pride can stand in the way of man’s personal salvation through Jesus Christ.  To be saved, one must step out of pride and humble himself to God.

In Leviticus 23:40 we find: “You shall take for yourself on the first day the fruit of goodly vines.”   The sages indicate that this fruit is the etrog.  It is the only fruit which remains on the vine for year to year.   This is a picture of constancy.   In Psalms 36:12 David is speaking of consistently not being overtaken by pride. The adjective in the Leviticus passage “hadar” for “goodly” means beautiful.   Without the “he” the word is “dor” which means generations or eternity.   The citron grows on the eternally beautiful vine.   Remember in John 15:5 where Jesus says: “I am the vine you are the branches, if a man remains in me and I in him he will bear much fruit, for without me you can do nothing.”   I know I was raised to believe that the “fruit’ represents “souls” in our evangelistic effort.  Although I believe in evangelism, I do have to admit that is not what the disciples heard when Jesus taught this.  When they heard the word “fruit” they were most likely thinking in terms of the citron or etrog and all it symbolized.  Faith, repentance, healing, redemption,  consistency and of course humility.  This is the fruit of abiding in the eternally beautiful vine which is Jesus Christ.

Ok, what else can I say about the citron or etrog?  There were four plants commanded by God to be used on the Sukkoth.  Each plant represented a major organ of the body.   The palm tree represented the spine, the myrtle represented the eyes and the willow represented the lips.   Chief  among the plants was the etrog which is shaped like a heart and represents the heart.  The Hebrew word for heart is “lev.”   The sages point out that the first letter in the five books of the Bible, the Torah is a beth and the last letter is a lamed which spells the word for heart. The Torah represents the heart of God. At the conclusion of the Sukkoth you have the Simchah Torah or the rejoicing with the Torah or the rejoicing with the heart of God.

And the final application for etrog as an acronym for Psalms 36:12 is that the etrog, like all plants, are clearly dependent upon the providential care of God.  The sun, the soil, the rain in its proper season, all must interact to produce the harvest that the festival of Sukkoth celebrates.   Pride makes us think we can prevail without Divine assistance.  The etrog reminds us that we can achieve nothing without God.

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