Exodus 21:19:  “If he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote [him] be quit: only he shall pay [for] the loss of his time, and shall cause [him] to be thoroughly healed.”

 

Proverbs 17:22:  “A merry heart doeth good [like] a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.”

 

In researching my new book about the Talmud I ran across something that I found very interesting and how the rabbis see things in Scripture that would drive a Christian Bible teacher to distraction.  Yet, might I remind you  that these are the people of the Old Testament and the masters of the Hebrew language.  They have been reading into Scripture hundreds of years before Christians ever came on the scene. I say we at least give them a hearing.

 

With that, let me quote to you how they translate Exodus 21:19 and share with you one of their interpretations.  The Talmud teaches that there are seventy faces to Torah.  That means that every passage of Scripture has at least seventy different understandings.  We will spend eternity studying the Word of God.  We will never arrive at it depths.  So this is just one of the many interpretations.

 

I am quoting the Talmud in Bava Kamma 85a from the English translation where they render Exodus 21:19 from the Hebrew as “He shall pay for the loss of his work, and he shall fully heal him.”  “From here is derived that a physician is allowed to heal (and we do not say that since God afflicted the person, it is forbidden to cure him).”  So what does that mean. That itself is open to interpretation. This is just a translation from the Aramaic after all and that word cure gahah is open to interpretation.  The wife of Rabbi Shmuel of Lubavitch fell ill and the doctors were unanimous in their opinion that the woman had no hope of recovery.   When the woman’s father heard this, Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch said: “The Talmud (referring to Bava Kamma 85a) specifically derives from the Torah (Exodus 21:19) that a physician is allowed to heal, but nowhere has a doctor been given the right to declare a human being incurable.” Again the English word incurable is a translation from the Aramaic.

 

Basically what he is saying is that a physician can heal but only God can gahah which we say in English is cure.  Therein lies the rub, what is the difference between cure and heal.   The word heal in Hebrew is rapha’. The word we render as cure is gehah.  It is used only once in the Old Testament, Proverbs 17:22 and is rendered as medicine. Yet, it is used quite a bit in extra Biblical literature. Our Christian lexicons only say it means to cure or heal.  The Talmud teaches that there are not synonyms in the Classical Hebrew so there must be some shade of difference between rapha’ and gehah.   Tracing this word gehah in its Semitic root you find it has the idea of being freed or set free in the old Canaanite language. Checking references for the Targums, Talmud and Midrash I find the Aramaic version of this word to be identical to the Hebrew word gehah and means to stoop over something as to protect it. 

 

I read where a Navy Seal threw himself on a grenade to save his friends. Using his body to shield his friends from the shrapnel would fit the word gehah.  Thus a merry heart provides a protection.  Thus what the Talmud is saying as one of the many interpretations of Exodus 21:19 is that a physician can heal, he can diagnosis, provide the prescriptions, the type of care needed but he cannot cure gehah that is he cannot protect you, only God can do that.

 

There are actually people who believe that medical science will find a way to extend their lives indefinitely and they are following all the standards of care, diet, exercise etc. that is recommended by physicians in the hopes of extending their lives until science comes up with a way to extend it indefinitely.  There is nothing to protect that person from the many other ways that life may end, through violence, accident or even illness.

 

When it comes down to it, we are on this earth for only as long as God planned for us to be here if we are in the center of His will.  When he decides that it is time, there is nothing any physician can do about it.  If it is not time it does not matter what any physician will say for all they can do is rapha’ they cannot gehah.

 

I know that opens a lot of question about the free will of man and making bad choices which could end your life. No one can answer that question as to what control man has over life and death, but one thing is certain, if we are in the very center of God’s will and His will is being accomplished in our lives we will listen to that still small voice of what to eat and what not to eat, where to go and not go etc. and we will live as long as God intended us to live.

 

I believe what the Talmud is teaching is that when God has total control over your life such that His will is being accomplished in your life, then truly a physician may be able to rapha’ that is to heal but he cannot gehah cure or protect.

 

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