I don’t usually write at night but I just read across something and want to ink some of this out before I go to bed…
khesed/grace/mercy throughout the Old Testament is, by definition, costly.
that’s the statement I read tonight
It also involves hospitality, honor, and covenant. It is something that, when it happens, allows, or maybe even INVITES, the recipient to abuse the favor shown.
For instance. Abram shows hospitality to the three men walking by, and they share with him some secret: they are going to destroy Sodom. Abram, who has now been their host to eat and rest but also their guest to some very important secret information, abuses his right to this information and asks them if they would spare the city if such and such number of people could be found righteous in it. The three men do not object, but engage in the haggling for the spare-price of Sodom.
Lot does it with these same men when they come to his home. He hosts them, and protects them with what would be a very costly price (he offers the townsmen his own virgin daughters for sex acts so that they will spare the visitors he is hosting). Part of his hosting them is khesed simply because of that moment right there. If it isn’t costly, it isn’t khesed.
I don’t have time tonight (in 9 minutes it will be tomorrow and I’ll regret staying up so late) but I’d be interested in other places in the scriptures where hosting a guest involves 2 things:
1. the guest boldly asking for more than the host originally offered
2. the host having to pay an extraordinarily high price (or at least trying to) for the sake of the guest.
Go!
