IS THERE A DEFINITION OF THE GLORY OF GOD?
The concept, ‘the glory of God’ is very difficult to get a handle on. The phrase is used in so many ways and in so many contexts that no one definition seems adequate. But there is an incident in the Bible where the main features of the ‘glory of God’ are identified, and so can provide us with a limited definition which may help. During a dispensation-changing encounter when God provided a legal framework for the nation of Israel, Moses asked God for a glimpse of His glory. In acceding to this request the LORD first described what would happen, and then fulfilled it exactly as He described it. The experience was clearly tailored to suit the need of Moses, and indicated how the glory of the LORD related to humankind. In it, God’s glory was tied up with His Name and His goodness. When the LORD appeared, He proclaimed what the rabbis came to call the ‘Thirteen Attributes of Mercy’ (Hebrew - shelosh ʿesreh middot). “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin” (Exod. 34:6,7). Only after the thirteen attributes of mercy does He mention the attribute of justice, “by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation” (Ex.34.7). In His relationship with humankind, God must exercise righteous judgment, but He delights in showing mercy. In these verses, His magnanimous qualities are emphasized over His judgmental actions. He demonstrated this priority once and for all by sending the Messiah, his own Son, to take the judgment called for by His own righteousness, and to provide mercy for all who would receive it.
So, in His relationship with humankind, it is the LORD’S mercy that provides the beating heart of His glory. He certainly made sure that Moses knew exactly the qualities that expressed His glory most fully. “Goodness and truth” could equally be translated “Kindness and faithfulness”. The Hebrew ḥesed ve-ʾemet appears frequently as a word pair to express a single concept. Each of the components has a wide range of meaning. Ḥesed involves acts of beneficence, mutuality, and often also obligations that flow from a legal relationship. ʾEmet, usually translated “truth,” encompasses reliability, durability, and faithfulness. The combination of terms expresses God’s absolute and eternal dependability in dispensing His benefactions. They are enumerated - mercy, grace, longsuffering, and forgiveness for iniquity, transgression and sin. (These last three are the Biblical descriptors that are used to summarise all kinds of sin – sins of word, sins of thought, sins of deed, sins of commission, sins of omission, secret sins and open sins, accidental sins and presumptuous sins, deliberate sins and unintentional sins, sins against man and sins against God, sinful motives that produce sinful actions as well as the sinful actions themselves.) Having said, “I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion,” (Exod. 33:19) the act is described more fully in its performance. Its structure was something like the custom of Eastern potentates who would send a herald before them, to announce their name, attributes and high ranking titles. “Now the LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, ‘The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation’” (Ex 34:5-7). It is clear that both righteousness and mercy are elements of His glory, but if righteousness is the foundation, mercy is the capstone. As James wrote: “Mercy triumphs over judgment”. (James 2:13)
The Name of God used in the proclamation of His goodness is the identifier that is considered by the Hebrew nation as the holiest and most Jewish of all God’s Names. It is written with four consonants YHWH (yud, hei, vav, hei) and is referred to as the Tetragrammaton (Greek for ‘four letter word’), or the ‘Ineffable Name of God’, sometimes reduced to ‘Ha-Shem’ (the Name). This Name is the Name that takes precedence in the relationship of God with humankind, and stresses the divine qualities of loving kindness and mercy. It is the Name strongly connected to the covenant relationship between the LORD and Israel. It reappears again and again in those compound names that are so precious, i.e. Jehovah-Jireh; Jehovah-Nissi; Jehovah-Tzidkenu; although the use of ‘Jehovah’ is the result of using the vowels of ‘Adonai’ with the Tetragrammaton to be able to pronounce the Name that had ceased to be verbalised after the fall of the Temple in AD70.
Moses, the man, who was the mediator of a covenant of works, asked to see the glory of God and was granted to see a manifestation of the goodness, grace, mercy, truth, longsuffering and forgiveness of God, which was integrally bound up in His Name. We are reminded of the connection with the Decalogue, “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.” (Exod. 20:7) Moses, the man whose work is synonymous with legalism and justice was reminded that mercy is His glory. So even as far back in the T’nach as Moses, we are impelled to consider that the Lord’s dealings with man, in grace and gift, were to His own glory.
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