FULL OF GRACE

AND TRUTH
Bible Study on John I:I4-18

Hand Ucko

Haris Ucko is program/nen jecretalyfor inter-rehligiousw relationd and dialoque fii'th the World
Coiuicl of Chuichdes. This Bible study reflects laizch that the autbhor has learned fi,o7n hisbffiend
Rev. Dr Giran Larsson,formner director at the S&veXdibh Theological Institute in Jerusalein, to
fvholn he ii'dbhed to acknofileedge his gratitude/for hbi linsihts and erutditioln.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as
of a father's only son, full'of grace and truth. (John testified to him and cried out, "This
was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before
me."') From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was given
through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God.
It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.
(John 1:14-18)
The LORD passed before him, and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD, a God merci-
ful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast lo'e and faithbfulness, keeping
steadfast lovefor the thoujandthgeneration,l forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet
by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children
and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation." (Ex. 34:6-7)
The assembly theme, "God, inYour Grace, Transform the World", is a prayer recognizing that
God with mercy changes the world to something better; it isa prayer for a genuine tikkun olani,
a mending of creation and the long-awaited ushering in of justice, peace and human dignity.
The transformation of the world needs to be all-inclusive; it is a transformation of unjust struc-
tures and individual inclinations, of the world out there and the world inside us. The church-
es and the religious institutions are not exempt. The prayer cannot imply that we shrink from
our calling and ask God to do the transformation. We need to be open for transformation our-
selves in relation to the world and to the other, seeing the world and the other with grace.
Today's Bible study invites a closer look at John 1:14-18 and focuses on the word "grace".
The, text is well known. The words are dense with meaning. The language is liturgical: "The

l Literally: full of grace and truth, keeping grace for thousands.

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Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's
only son, full of grace and truth... From his fullness, we have all received, grace upon grace...
No one has ever seen God." Coming from a "high church" tradition, the Church of Sweden,
and having been ordained in this church, my relationship to the words "the Word became
flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full
of grace and truth" seem very concrete. I have read the words of consecration in the
eucharist, I have lifted up the bread and the wine, and I kneel and whisper to myself, "The
Word became flesh and lived among us. His glory is full of grace and truth."

Pitfalls of translation
We need, however, to recognize that the text has also been used to support another reading,
justifying a polarization between the Law of Moses and the grace and truth of Christ. The
word grace appears plenty of times in these few verses: "full of grace and truth", we have
received "grace upon grace", "grace and truth" came through Jesus Christ. In-verse 17 we
read: "The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus
Christ." This is the reading as interpreted by the NRSV. There are two sentences here: the
law through Moses, grace and truth through Christ. I do not think I am jumping to conclu-
sions when I say that many will hear a "but" between these two sentences. There is no "but"
in the Greek original, but we hear a "but". The law was inideed given through Moses but
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. The NRSV version and many other transrations
which do not have the "but" may reflect in their translation the last Fifty years of Jewish-
Christian dialogue. It does away with a reading that for centuries p'rovided a polarization
read into the verse: there was law but then there was grace and truth. The "but"-translation
reflects a Christian theology of supercession, or the replacement of Judaism. Up to a point,
the old covenant was valid, but not any more. We have something that is much more. One
may be willing to give some crumbs of recognition to Moses, but he ishenceforth passe. We
all know it from our own context. We do the same, when we want to badmouth someone
and we feel we cannot do it just like that. So we say, "Well, he is a nice guy, but..." and then
we go on with the real thing, the badmouthing. The preface was only to create the space for
badmouthing. So we say: "The law was given, but grace and truth ismuch better." Allow me
to read a couple of these translations to make my point that this verse was understood to
support a polarization between old and new, law and gospel, law and merit on one side and
grace and truth on the other, between Judaism and Christianity.
This is how the verse has been and continues to be interpreted through various Bible trans-
lations, and through these taught in Christian education and homiletics:
* For the Law was given through Moses, grace and truth were realized through Jesus
Christ (NASB).

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* We got the basics from Moses, and then this exuberant giving and receiving. This end-.
less knowing and understanding - all this came through Jesus, the Messiah (The
Message).
. While the law was given through Moses, grace unearned, undeserved favour and spiri-
tual blessing and truth came through Jesus Christ (Amplified Bible).
* For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came. by.Jesus Christ (King James
Version).
* The law was given through Moses, but loving and truth came through Jesus Christ (New
Life Version).
* The law was given by Moses, but Jesus Christ brought us undeserved kindness and truth
(Contemporary English Version).
* For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ
(New King James Version)!
e For the law was given by Moses; but grace and truth is made by Jesus Christ (Wycliffe).
e Moses gave us the law. Jesus Christ has given us grace and truth (New International
Readers Version).
All these readings portray the situation as if grace and truth did not exist before Christ..
We must therefore be grateful to the NRSV and other translations trying to do away
with a polarization that is not present in the Greek, but which grows out of a Christian
theology, which saw the church supersede Judaism. Christian theology influenced the
Bible translation. This theology is not so easy to do away with. There are quite a few
who while reading the NRSV still insert a mental "but" to express the contrast between
"the law" and "grace and truth". The theological thinking goes like this: Before they knew
only the God of the Old Testament, but now in the New Testament, we have grace
and truth. Or if one is more cautious, one will say that grace and truth may have
been there but they were not'known -before the coming of Christ. In the vein of a neces-
sary transformation, we need, to be vigilant so as not to perpetuate such polarized read-
ings.
Let us enter the text. The verses 14-18 are a typical Jewish Midrash, i.e. a commentary on
scripture, the Hebrew scriptures, the Old Testament, as there was at this time no other
scripture. John isfirst of all fully rooted in the Jewish tradition of keeping the name of God
holy, cautious not to utter it in vain and therefore as in this case to use other ways of saying
God without mentioning the name. Here he uses divinuminpasdivtu, the divine passive. John
says, "The law was given." We can begin guessing which text John is referring to because
of the emphasis John puts on the words "grace and truth", in Hebrew hesed we-emetb. The
text John refers to is the text before us, Exodus 34:6-7. The context of the text is God giv-
ing Torah to the Jews. The LORD passed before him, and he proclaimed,."The LORD, the

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LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and
faithfulness [literally vra, hesed wve-emeth, nozer heved la-alafim], full of grace and truth, keep-
ing grace for thousands.
John knows this text; it is a well-known text; it is a summary of the scriptures, just as we
may call John 3:16 a summary of the Bible. The words are written on arks in synagogues
that give shelter to the Torah scrolls and on the curtain covering the ark. It issuch an impor-
tant text because the people of Israel realize that God isreally a God full of he6ed. This is the
second time the people receive the law. There has already been the story featuring the gold-
en calf. No one would be surprised if there were consequences for the people having attrib-
uted to the gqlden calf the gift of liberation out of bondage, if God judged the people, "vis-
iting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children's children, to the third
and the fourth generation". But the measure of God's heed is proved to be more than the
measure of God's judgment. There is a Midrash to the story of Moses receiving the Torah.
Moses saw how God wrote the words "vrav hesed", -full of grace, in the' Torah, and asked:
"Does this mean that you have patience with the pious?" But God answered, "No, with sin-
ners also am-I long-suffering." "What!" exclaimed Moses. "Let the sinners perish!" God said
no more,.but when Moses later, upon seeing how the people defected to the golden calf,
implored God's mercy, begging God to forgive the sin of the people of Israel, God answered
Moses, "Didn't you tell me not to have patience with sinners and to destroy them?" "Yes,"
said Moses, "but didn't you say that you were long-suffering with sinners also? So, let now
the patience of the Lord be great according to your own words." The measure of judgment
isthree or four generations long, but the measure of grace is one thousand generations.

Grace beyond measure

Hesed is a very graphic word. It is that part of an overfull measure which is on top of the
measure itself. When you go shopping and the salesperson appreciates the customer, he
might giveyou beed, i.e. he heaps something on top, instead of one kilo, you get a little extra.
.You won't have to pay for it.It is the cup which flows over (Ps. 23:5) or it is a "good meas-
ure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, (which) will be put into your lap; for the
measure you give will be the measure you get back" (Luke 6:38).
The Exodus text overflows with hesed: vrav heAed we-eneth, nozer hesed la-alafim. The Jewish
tradition is convinced that there are no redundant words in the scriptures. There must thus
be a reason for the repetition of the word hesed. God has graced the people with a renewal
of the covenant but there is more hesed to come. God keeps, stores, holds in God's hands
more heded, hesed for the future. The thousands are in view, the coming generations, all the
nations. It is the same when God blesses Abraham. Abraham is not blessed for the sake of
Abraham. He is blessed because God has someone in sight beyond Abraham. Or as in

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Exodus ( 19:5), God addresses the people, "You shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy
nation, because the whole earth ismine." The whole earth isthe ultimate concern of God.
John knows that "the law indeed was given through Moses". He now refers to the Exodus
text by recalling the catchword for the whole verse: grace and truth, hesed wie-emetb. The
grace kept in store is,as John tells the story about "the Word became flesh and lived among
us", pouring out over the thousand. This is the time of the ingathering of the gentiles, the
gentiles are coming to join the kingdom of priests and a holy nation, they-are joining the peo-
ple, once taken out of Egypt, graced in spite of the golden calf, renewed in covenant. God,
full of grace and truth, which istruth to be trusted, is keeping grace for the thousands. Now
is the time. This, is the moment of truth, not as an objective truth, but as a truth that John
has experienced in his heart. It is like when you yourself are moved beyond your own con-
fines. You are full of awe. ThisIts not the time for metaphysical inflation. But it is a convic-
tion based on a passionate commitment to goodness and the goodness of being. There is no
contrast, no 'but" involved, no polarization between the old and the new, no discarding one
for the other. The law was given as a sign of grace, and now the grace stored is poured out.

Keeping the faith

There is additional support for my suggestion that God has shown grace to the people of Israel
and has stored grace for the thousand, and that John refers to this in the text before us. If we
open any Torah scroll and read the verse of Exodus 34:7, where the first Hebrew word isnozer,
the one who keeps, we shall see it. The first letter is the letter nun, the equivalent of an N. This
letter is Written in a way that differs from how one usually would write it. The letter nun is here
much bigger than any other of the letters; it is therefore called a lIU/2 rabbati, a big N, which
goes beyond what a capital N would look like. You would find the same in every Torah scroll.

The 'Hebrew text of Exodus 34:7 a, "nozer hesed la'alafim" or "keeping faith (or 'steadfast
love') for thousands". The initial Hebrew letter (reading right to left) is traditionally printed
in a larger size than the surrounding text in order to emphasize God's graciousness.

The Jqfer, the scribe, wanted to make the reader observant; please note, this is.a secret I am
telling you. Grace is being kept: in store for the future. And this future is now, says John. And
God kept it in store for this time. Let us read Matthew 2:23 in this light: "There he made his
home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be
fulfilled., 'He will be called a Nazorean."' The root is the same, AVZR. Jesus is a lotzri, someone
from Nazareth, a place, which makes us remember the Hebrew words nzozer besed la-alafIim,
keeping grace for thousands. Exegetes will say, "But surely, Nazareth is related to the word
netzer, as in the words of Isaiah 11:1, 'A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a

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HIM, slck-o FULL OF GRACE AND TRUTH

branch shall grow out of his roots."' This is also possible, but does not prevent us from dis-
covering how the root form of one word can have a pluriform use.
The Hebrew scriptures and the Jewish tradition welcome such readings. There isin fact space
for plurality in reading and interpreting Hebrew scriptures. There is not only one reading
allowed. There are at least seventy possibilities, because one believed that there would be sev-
enty different nations living in the world. Each of them had his or her face. The text, it is said,
has seventy faces, seventypanim. Every nation has its own understanding of the text. There is
nothing to worry about in this. It is as normal as it is that in a company of two Jews there will
be three opinions. It is quite normal and it should be like this. A plurality of views can only
enrich us. The Midrash says that Moses, when receiving the Torah, saw that God was occu-
pied ornamenting the letters in which the Torah was written. He made little crown-like deco-
rations on the letters. Moses looked on without saying a word. God then said to him, "In your
home, do not people know the greeting.of peace?" Moses replied, "Should a servant address
his master?" God said to Moses, "You could at least have wished me success in my labour."
Then Moses inquired as to the significance of the crowns upon the letters, and was answered,
"There will some day be a man called Akiva, who will interpret every dot of these letters."
Moses said to God, "Could I see him?" And Moses was sent into the future, into a synagogue
where Akiva was teaching the Torah. But Moses was not able to follow the discussions.
Suddenly a disciple of Akiva asked the rabbi, "How do you know all this?" Akiva answered,
"This was given to Moses on Mount Sinai." Moses was surprised but content. He realized that
the Torah would become the source of enrichment, even in ways that he never imagined.

Songs of Moses and the Lamb

One of the greatest examples of plurality, and not of polarizing contrast, not of a "but" for
disparaging the other but in tension and as an indication of God's grace and truth, is the final
demonstration of plurality in the Bible. In Revelations 15:3 we read,
And I saw what appeared to be a sea of glass mixed with fire, and those who had con-
quered the beast and its image and the number of its name, standing beside the sea of
glass with harps of God in their hands. And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of
God, and the song of the Lamb: "Great and amazing are your deeds, Lord God the
Almighty! Just and true are your ways, King of the-nations! Lord, who will not fear and
glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you,
for your judgments have been revealed."
They sing the song of Moses; they sing the song of the L;amb. And both songs go together.
One is not silencing the other. They both have a song to sing.
It seems to me that this is an indication of what amazing grace is all about. There is room
for the other, there is room for plurality, and God enjoys listening to them all as they wor-
ship before God. And all the people said, Amen.

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TITLE: Full of Grace and Truth: Bible Study on John 1:14-18

SOURCE: Ecum Rev 56 no3 Jl 2004
WN: 0418803486012

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