Welcome to Torah Today Ministries and a new episode of our series, The Hebrew Key. The name of this one is “Torah Incarnate.” And there’s a little backstory to this.
I find myself reading in different parts of the Bible at the same time. I’ve been reading through the book of Hosea just on like an endless loop going through it over and over again. And it’s wonderful how each time something new rises to the surface. But I’m also doing a detailed verse-by-verse study through the book of Proverbs.
And one morning last week, I happened to be reading in Hosea and then reading in Proverbs chapter 8. And something just kind of came together. And the result of that is what I’m about to share with you.
So let’s look at the Hosea passage first. Hosea 4:6. God is speaking and says:
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge because you have rejected knowledge. I reject you from acting as a priest to me.” (Hosea 4:6a)
Now look at this next phrase:
“And since you have forgotten the Torah of your God, I also will forget your children.” (Hosea 4:6b)
Let me read that again. “And since you have forgotten the Torah of your God, I also will forget your children.”
It’s as if God is saying, “I’m the father who fathered the Torah. You are parents who have fathered children. And since you have forgotten my child, the Torah, I will forget your children.”
Now, we can get into all of the theology of does God forget people and forget their children. That’s not the point of this. The point of this is that God is inferring that the Torah itself is his child, his offspring.
Now, just hold that for a moment.
And here’s this beautiful passage in Proverbs 8. Now what in Proverbs 8, as in much of the early part of Proverbs, you have wisdom herself speaking. Lady Wisdom. She’s calling people, she’s calling those to come to her to learn wisdom, to learn musar (מוּסָר), to change their foolish ways and begin to act as wise people.
And they refer to wisdom as a woman because the word chokmah (חָכְמָה), wisdom, is feminine so it just makes sense.
But wisdom itself in the Jewish mindset is embodied in the Torah itself. And so when a Jewish person reads through Proverbs and reads wisdom speaking, they see it as the Torah speaking because without the Torah, we would not have a vessel to hold God’s wisdom.
So just remember that, that’s how a Jewish person would read this passage.
But listen to what wisdom says:
“Adonai possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from eternity. From the beginning, before the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth. When there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth, while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the beginning of the dust of the world.” (Proverbs 8:22-26)
“When he prepared the heavens, I was there. When he ordained the circle upon the face of the deep, when he established the skies above, when the foundations of the deep became strong, when he imposed on the sea his decree that the waters should not pass his commandment, when he appointed the foundations of the earth, then I was by him his…” (Proverbs 8:27-30a)
And now here I’ve got a Hebrew word because this Hebrew word can be translated one of two ways. And the word is amon (אָמוֹן). “I was by him his amon.”
“And I was daily his delight. Rejoicing always before him. Rejoicing in the habitable part of the earth. And my delights were with the sons of men.” (Proverbs 8:30b-31)
What does this word amon mean? Well, most translations are going to translate it as master workman or architect or master craftsman. You’ll see most translations do that.
But some translations translate it as a young companion, a nursing, a little child, an infant.
And I like both of those because they’re both true.
You know, the rabbis have this saying that when God went to create the earth, the heavens and the earth, he looked into the blueprint of the Torah. They don’t use the word blueprint, of course, but he looked into the Torah to see what the plans for the earth should be.
Because the entire world, the heavens and the earth were founded on wisdom. They were made with wisdom. And that same wisdom was given to us in the Torah.
That’s why the Torah is just eternal. And we can look at its words and the letters, but the depths to those words and the message beneath those words goes on and on and on. You can never get to the bottom of the Torah. It is the encapsulation, the vessel of God’s own wisdom.
So we can see that the wisdom was his master workman, his architect, so to speak, his craftsman, but also his child.
And even the way it is worded here when it says, “I was by him his nursing, and I was daily his delight.” Like a father with a little child, just delighting in that child, rejoicing always before him. As a child will rejoice in the presence of his father, rejoicing in the habitable part of this earth and my delights were with the sons of men.
So this talk is more like the talk of a child just enjoying everything around and not so much as an architect who’s just rejoicing before him and playing and being his daily delight. It’s a very childlike talk.
Now what I find amazing about this is we know that the world was created, God created the world through the Messiah, through Yeshua. All you have to do is just read through the first part of John chapter 1:
“In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word is what God was. The same was in the beginning with God.” (John 1:1-2)
And it talks about how everything was made through the Word and nothing that was made was made unless it was made through the Word. And then you go on through and it says:
“And that Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John 1:14)
So we see that the Word was with God in the beginning and through the Word God created the heavens and the earth.
So we look at this word amon as a master builder or craftsman, an architect, but also as a child.
And if we think of Messiah who is in the beginning with God and through whom God created the earth, when God spoke the earth into existence, he had to have been speaking words. He had to be speaking.
And we’re told that Yeshua is the Alpha and the Omega, the A and the Z, the Aleph (א) and the Tav (ת). “I am the Alpha and the Omega. I am the alphabet through which God’s speech is formed.”
And so when we speak, we speak words that are spelled with letters of the alphabet. When God spoke forth the heavens and the earth, he spoke with letters of the alphabet, the aleph through the tav. And Yeshua says, “I am the aleph and the tav. I am the alphabet. I am the building blocks of God’s speech and everything he has to say he says through me.”
So we see that somehow Messiah was there in the beginning with God, used by God as His creator, but also that Word was born in a manger many years later and he came into the world as a nursing.
So if you have to pick either master workman, architect, craftsman, or nursing, I don’t know how you make your choice because this word describes Messiah in both of those roles.
Let’s go a little bit further. Metzudot (מְצוּדוֹת) is a name given to a rabbi, Rabbi David Altschuler, who lived from 1687 to 1769. But he wrote a book called Metzudat David (מְצוּדַת דָּוִד) and it’s like an explanation of the book of Proverbs, a great commentary on Proverbs.
So if you are ever reading a commentary and it puts down there “this is from Metzudot,” it’s from Rabbi Altschuler. And this is what he wrote:
“The Torah was like God’s beloved child, nurtured by him and a source of constant delight.”
And here’s what’s interesting. I studied Greek a little bit on my own many, many years ago. And I remember that one of the primary words for child in Greek used in the Koine Greek that our New Testament scriptures are written in is the word teknon (τέκνον).
And I’d heard someone mention how this word for child, teknon, is also related to the word technology through which we build things. I did some research and if you go to the notes which there will be a link for those at the bottom of the screen, you can see that indeed they do share the same root.
Teknon is child. Techne (τέχνη) is technology for building. And they say both of these come from the same original root which means production, bringing something into reality.
So even in Greek you have teknon (child) and you have techne (building, technology).
And that word teknon is even used in Luke 2:48 where Mary is speaking to young Yeshua. Now again, she spoke to him not in Greek but in Aramaic or Hebrew. But in Luke 2:48, this is how it is in the Greek:
“And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, ‘Teknon (child), why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.’” (Luke 2:48)
This, of course, is the story of Yeshua when he was 12 years old and they had gone to Jerusalem for Passover and Mary and Joseph were leaving at the end of the holy day, the mo’ed, and they realized Yeshua was not with them and they had to go back and look for him and found him in the temple speaking with the priests and rabbis.
But even there in the Greek, Mary refers to Yeshua as a teknon, a child.
And this understanding that the Messiah is something that predates creation is something that’s very well founded in Jewish thought. Here’s a passage from the Babylonian Talmud, Pesachim 54a. It says:
“Seven phenomena were created before the world was created.”
Seven phenomena were created before the world was created. Now, I don’t know where they get these seven, but the first one and the last one are the ones I want us to focus on. Here they are:
First one mentioned is Torah. The last one is the name of the Messiah because after all the Torah is embodied in the life of our Messiah Yeshua.
So this is to me fascinating. In Hosea we see God inferring that the Torah is his child. And then in Proverbs 8, we see wisdom referred to as a nursing, a child that was with God when he was creating the universe, before he created the universe. But let’s keep carrying this on a little bit further.
Let’s look again at Proverbs 8 and verse 30. It said there, “Then I was by him as his amon,” and here again you can have either, take your pick: master workman or you can have nursing, whichever one you prefer.
“And I was daily his delight.”
Now that word “daily” is the word yom yom (יוֹם יוֹם). The word yom (יוֹם) means day. So when you say yom yom it means “day by day” or “daily,” every day.
So “I was his delight yom yom, every day, daily.”
And of course everything is picked apart. The rabbis look into every spelling, the wording of every phrase. Why this word used? Why that word is not used? How, why things are put in this order. They analyze the Hebrew in ways you can’t even begin to imagine.
And so in the Midrash Rabbah, Vayikra Rabbah 19:1, there’s this amazing insight. This is what it says:
“Rav Huna said in the name of Resh Lakish, the Torah preceded the creation of the world by 2,000 years.”
Now, how did they come up with 2,000 years?
Well, here’s how they did it. As scripture states, “I was then his amon. I was then his delight yom yom, day after day.”
And a day of the Holy One, blessed is he, is equal to 1,000 years, as scripture states:
“For a thousand years in your eyes are but a bygone yesterday.” (Psalm 90:4)
This is what it looks like: “For a thousand years in your sight are but as a day when it has passed.” That phrase “as a day” is k’yom (כְּיוֹם), like a yom.
So if a day is like a thousand years and it says that wisdom was God’s delight before creation yom yom (day, day) and if a day is a thousand years, then he has this fanciful insight that wisdom was brought forth 2,000 years before the creation. The Torah preceded the creation of the world by 2,000 years.
You see how it all works. You can back it up and listen to this again if you got a little bit lost there.
But let’s go ahead and just go along with this for a moment. Let’s just play along and say that God brought wisdom and codified it and brought it into existence 2,000 years before he created the heavens and the earth in Genesis 1.
We put this all together. It’s interesting that if the Torah, wisdom itself, came into existence 2,000 years before the heavens and the earth, right?
Isn’t it interesting that Yeshua came to earth as a nursing about 2,000 years before the coming of the kingdom?
Because I do believe we are in the last days and it’s been almost 2,000 years since Messiah was here. Of course, this is the year 2025. It sounds like it’s been 2025 years, but we know for a fact that our year count is off and it hasn’t been quite 2,000 years yet. But however you calculate it, we’re very close.
So I just find it interesting and I hope you find it interesting too to see how the Jewish mind, the rabbinic mind plays with the scriptures and the words in scriptures and come up with some of these amazing insights.
But you know Yeshua is the Torah made flesh and the Torah is the vessel for wisdom. So the wisdom of God is embodied in the Torah. And if the Torah is embodied in Yeshua, that means God’s wisdom is embodied in Yeshua.
But do we have a verse that actually says that? Yes, we do. 1 Corinthians 1:23-24 says this:
“But we proclaim Messiah crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Messiah, the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:23-24)
Messiah is the wisdom of God.
He is the architect through whom God created the heavens and the earth. He’s also the nursing born in a manger, the architect of our salvation as well.
So anyways, I will leave you with that and I could keep rattling on, but I’m not going to. But I hope you enjoyed this and you might go back and listen to it again because there were a lot of concepts brought together, woven together.
But welcome to the traditional Jewish way of engaging the scriptures. It’s almost like children playing with precious jewels and building things out of God’s precious truths and his wisdom. And our heavenly Father delights when we do so.
So, I hope you’ve enjoyed this. Till next time, I wish you shalom and may God bless.
Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from acting as a priestto Me. And since you have forgotten the Torah of your God, I also will forget your children.
Proverbs 8:22-31 Adonai possessed me in the beginning of His way, before His works of old. 23 I was set up from eternity, from the beginning, before the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth; while as yet He had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the beginning of the dust of the world. When He prepared the heavens I was there; when He ordained the circle upon the face of the deep; when He established the skies above, when the fountains of the deep became strong; when He imposed on the sea His decree that the waters should not pass His commandment, when He appointed the foundations of the earth: then I was by Him His אמון (amon), and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him; rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth, and my delights were with the sons of men.
אמון (amon) = “master workman” OR “nursling”
Metzudot: “The Torah was like God’s beloved child, nurtured by Him and His source of constant delight.” – David Altschuler (1687-1769)
τέκνον (teknon) = “child”
Luke 2:48 And when His parents saw Him, they were astonished. And His mother said to Him, “Child (τέκνον), why have You treated us so? Behold, Your father and I have been searching for You in great distress.”
b. Pesachim 54a “Seven phenomena were created before the world was created, and they are: Torah, and repentance, and the Garden of Eden, and Gehenna, and the Throne of Glory, and the Temple, and the name of Messiah.”
Proverbs 8:30 Then I was by Him as His master workman/nursling, and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him.
יום יום (yom yom)
Vayikra Rabbah 19.1 – Rav Huna said in the name of Reish Lakish: The Torah preceded the creation of the world by two thousand years, as [Scripture] states, I was then His nursling, I was then His delight day after day [יום יום] and a day of the Holy One, blessed is He, is equal to one thousand years, as [Scripture] states, ‘For a thousand years in Your eyes are but a bygone yesterday.’ (Psalm 90:4)
Psalm 90:4 For a thousand years in Your sight are but as a day when it is past, or as a watch in the night.
כיום (ki-yom)
TORAH (2,000 years) The Earth
YESHUA (2,000 years) The Kingdom
1 Corinthians 1:23-24 … but we preach Messiah crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Messiah the power of God and the wisdom of God.
RESOURCES:
Exodus 19:6 “‘And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.”
Revelation 1:6 … and made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
Romans 2:20 … an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the Torah the embodiment of knowledge and truth –
There is an etymological connection between the Ancient Greek words τέχνη (tékhnē) and τέκνον (téknon). Both words are derived from the same Proto-Indo-European root, *tek-, meaning “to create” or “produce”. This shared root is also linked to the Greek verb τίκτω (tíktō), meaning “to give birth”. Here’s how this connection plays out in the meanings of the words: τέχνη (tékhnē): Refers to skill, craft, art, or technique. It emphasizes the productive aspect of creating something through skilled workmanship. This aligns with the root meaning of “to create” or “produce” in the sense of making something new or bringing it forth. τέκνον (téknon): Primarily means “child” or “offspring”. This relates to the root meaning of “to give birth” or “bring forth,” as a child is brought forth or produced by a parent. Therefore, both words reflect the idea of bringing something into existenceor production, but with different focuses: tékhnē on the act of making or crafting, and téknon on the result of giving birth or producing offspring. (Google search)