Exodus 34:6 · Symbol · Loyalty
The Words Chesed and Emet
The Hebrew nouns chesed and emet stand side by side in verses from Genesis to Zechariah.
When David sent away a foreign soldier on the day he fled Jerusalem, he blessed him with these two words.
Then the LORD passed in front of Moses and called out: “The LORD, the LORD God, is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness,
- The word
- חֵסֵד (chesed), H2617
- First appears
- Genesis 19:19 “Your servant has indeed found favor in your…”
Summary
Chesed is the Hebrew noun for loyal love and emet the noun for what is firm and true. When they stand in one verse, the first names a love and the second the faithfulness that keeps it. The pair runs from the stories of the patriarchs through the psalms and proverbs to the prophets.
- The Psalms hold the pair more often than any other book.
- The pair is asked of people, praised in God and required of kings.
- Chesed and emet each keep their own sense when they are joined.
The Pair at Its First Verse
Genesis 24 joins the two nouns in the thanks of Abraham's servant.
What did chesed and emet mean to the Old Testament writers who joined them? What does the pair add to the study of loyalty, the keeping of faith with God and with the people one is bound to? This study gives the verses in which the two stand together, each with its Berean words. It follows the pair from the patriarchs to the prophets and compares the glosses of the STEP Bible with the Berean renderings. It then sets out how two commentaries read John 1:14. It closes with a reader of Psalm 85:10 and with the last verse of Micah.
saying, “Blessed be the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who has not withheld His kindness and faithfulness from my master. As for me, the LORD has led me on the journey to the house of my master’s relatives.”The verse stands first because it is the earliest in the canon whose Hebrew holds both nouns, and the servant gives both to the LORD.
Where the Two Words Stand Together
Besides Genesis 24:27 and Micah 7:20, these are the verses whose Hebrew holds both nouns, and the Berean renders each as its verse needs.
The Berean Standard Bible renders chesed as loving devotion or kindness, and emet most often as faithfulness.
| Verse | Chesed | Emet | The Berean words |
|---|---|---|---|
| Genesis 24:49 | kindness | faithfulness | show kindness and faithfulness to my master |
| Genesis 32:10 | kindness | faithfulness | all the kindness and faithfulness You have shown Your servant |
| Genesis 47:29 | kindness | faithfulness | promise to show me kindness and faithfulness |
| Exodus 34:6 | loving devotion | faithfulness | abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness |
| Joshua 2:12 | kindness | sure | show kindness to my family … Give me a sure sign |
| Joshua 2:14 | kindness | faithfulness | we will show you kindness and faithfulness |
| 2 Samuel 2:6 | loving devotion | faithfulness | show you loving devotion and faithfulness |
| 2 Samuel 15:20 | loving devotion | faithfulness | May the LORD show you loving devotion and faithfulness. |
| 1 Kings 3:6 | loving devotion | faithfulness | You have shown much loving devotion … he walked before You in faithfulness |
| Psalm 25:10 | loving | faithful | All the LORD’s ways are loving and faithful |
| Psalm 26:3 | loving devotion | truth | Your loving devotion is before my eyes … I have walked in Your truth |
| Psalm 40:10 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Your loving devotion and faithfulness from the great assembly |
| Psalm 40:11 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Your loving devotion and faithfulness will always guard me |
| Psalm 57:3 | loving devotion | truth | His loving devotion and His truth |
| Psalm 57:10 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Your loving devotion reaches to the heavens … Your faithfulness to the clouds |
| Psalm 61:7 | loving devotion | faithfulness | appoint Your loving devotion and Your faithfulness to guard him |
| Psalm 69:13 | loving devotion | sure | In Your abundant loving devotion … Your sure salvation |
| Psalm 85:10 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Loving devotion and faithfulness have joined together |
| Psalm 86:15 | loving devotion | faithfulness | You, O Lord … abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness |
| Psalm 89:14 | loving devotion | faithfulness | loving devotion and faithfulness go before You |
| Psalm 108:4 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Your loving devotion extends beyond the heavens … Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds |
| Psalm 115:1 | loving devotion | faithfulness | because of Your loving devotion, because of Your faithfulness |
| Psalm 117:2 | loving devotion | faithfulness | great is His loving devotion toward us … the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever |
| Psalm 138:2 | loving devotion | faithfulness | for Your loving devotion and Your faithfulness |
| Proverbs 3:3 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Never let loving devotion or faithfulness leave you |
| Proverbs 14:22 | loving devotion | faithfulness | find loving devotion and faithfulness |
| Proverbs 16:6 | loving devotion | faithfulness | By loving devotion and faithfulness iniquity is atoned for |
| Proverbs 20:28 | loving devotion | faithfulness | Loving devotion and faithfulness preserve a king |
| Isaiah 16:5 | loving devotion | faithfulness | in loving devotion a throne will be established … will sit on it in faithfulness |
| Hosea 4:1 | loving devotion | truth | no truth, no loving devotion |
| Zechariah 7:9 | loving devotion | true | Administer true justice. Show loving devotion |
2 Samuel 2:6, 2 Samuel 15:20, 1 Kings 3:6, Psalm 25:10, Psalm 26:3, Psalm 40:10, Psalm 40:11, Psalm 57:3 and 17 more
From the Patriarchs to the Prophets
Narrative, psalm, proverb and prophecy each give the pair a work of its own.
Jacob asked Joseph for the two when he made him promise not to bury him in Egypt (Genesis 47:29). Israel's spies swore them to Rahab for hiding them in Jericho (Joshua 2:14).
David blessed the men of Jabesh-gilead with the pair because they had buried Saul (2 Samuel 2:5 to 6). Psalm 86:15 prays back to the LORD the words He proclaimed on Sinai.
Proverbs makes the two the guard of a ruler (Proverbs 20:28). Isaiah foresees a throne in the tent of David founded on chesed and held in emet (Isaiah 16:5). Hosea brings the LORD's case that neither could be found in the land (Hosea 4:1). Zechariah gives them as the LORD's charge to His people (Zechariah 7:9).
Two Words That Keep Their Own Senses
The tagging of the STEP Bible gives each noun a short gloss, and the Berean reads each verse for itself.
The tagging glosses chesed as loyalty at its first use in Genesis 19:19, where the Berean gives kindness.
In Proverbs 12:19 the tagging glosses emet as reliability, and the Berean speaks of truthful lips. In 2 Kings 20:19 it glosses the same noun as stability, and the Berean gives security.
Chesed and Emet in the Lexicon
The Tyndale House lexicon gives chesed the gloss kindness and emet the gloss stability.
Chesed, kindness and loving devotion
247 uses in the canon
Chesed (H2617), חֵסֵד, is the noun of the refrain of Psalm 136: “His loving devotion endures forever.”
Emet, faithfulness and truth
127 uses in the canon
Emet (H571), אֶמֶת, is the noun of the psalmist's praise of God's word: “The entirety of Your word is truth”.
Grace and Truth in John 1
Ellicott's commentary and the Pulpit Commentary each read John 1:14 against Exodus 34:6.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers calls John's phrase “a Hebrew formula, expressing a divine attribute”. It names the revelation of the divine nature to Moses as the passage “almost certainly present to the thought here”.
The Pulpit Commentary writes that “The combination of these two ideas of grace and truth pervades the Old Testament description of the Lord”.
The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.John's closing phrase in this verse is the one both commentaries read.
A Voice on Psalm 85:10
Jerome, in a homily on the psalm, reads its meeting of the two as fulfilled in Christ.
died 420 · Jerome
“Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed. Mercy and truth have met. I see two things, which by coming together and meeting become one. Justice and peace have kissed. All this is fitted to the mystery of the Lord and Savior: this is the Son of God and of man, who is for us truth, mercy, peace, and justice, in whom the justice of the former people and the mercy of the latter are joined together into one peace. ‘For he himself,’ says the Apostle, ‘is our peace, who has made both one.’”
Jerome · Homily 64, on Psalm 84 (Alternate Series) · on Psalm 85:10Patristic
The Pair Sworn to the Fathers
The last verse of Micah is a prayer that rests on the LORD's oath to the patriarchs.
You will show faithfulness to Jacob and loving devotion to Abraham, as You swore to our fathers from the days of old.The verse stands here because it gives the pair as something the LORD has sworn, the ground of every loyalty He asks.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- STEP Bible TBESH glosses (Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0), with the Strong's definitions (1890) the rows carry.
- STEP Bible, Translators Amalgamated Hebrew Old Testament, the tagged text (Tyndale House, Cambridge), CC BY 4.0.
- Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, on John 1:14.
- The Pulpit Commentary, on John 1:14.
- Jerome, Homily 64, on Psalm 84 (alternate series), on Psalm 85:10.
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