HOT NOSE BUT BIG HEART - A: Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

First Reading: Exo 34:4b-6, 8-9 (4 June 2023)

“The Lord, the Lord, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity” (Exo 34:6).

This is how the Book of Exodus describes God: he is filled with mercy, graciousness, kindness, and fidelity, resulting in his being “slow to anger”. The Hebrew formulation of this famous expression is erek ’appayim, which literally means “long nose”. It is because it features the word ’af, which is the Hebrew word for “nose”. In the Hebrew Bible, the conventional way of conveying an outburst in anger is when one’s nose burn hot (e.g., 1 Sam 17:28). This imagery is frequently applied to God’s explicit display of anger (e.g., Exo 4:14; 15:18; Psa 2:4-6). This ire could turn out to be very furious as seen, for example, in Deut 29:26: “They turned and served other gods, worshiping them, gods whom they had not known and whom he had not allotted to them; so the anger of the Lord (’af adonai) was kindled against that land, bringing on it every curse written in this book. The Lord uprooted them from their land in anger (’af), fury, and great wrath, and cast them into another land, as is now the case”.

By and large, God is presented as someone who has a short fuse for anger, so to say. The episode on Exodus 34 is actually the aftermath of God’s outburst of fury. It came as a result of the Israelites weariness that Moses had taken a long time staying in the mountain with Lord, already spending there “forty days and forty nights” (24:18). They made a golden calf out of their collected earrings (32:4) and offered before it many sacrifices (v. 6). Upon discovering this abomination, the Lord exclaimed to Moses, “Go down at once because your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt, have acted corruptly…. I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are…. Let me alone, then, that my anger may burn against them to consume them” (vv. 7, 9-10). But after hearing the intercession of Moses to spare God’s people, the “Lord changed his mind about the punishment he had threatened to inflict on his people” (v. 14).

Thus, even if God’s patience is essentially short, his mercy can quickly overshadow any wrath.

It should be underscored that Exo 34:6 describes the Lord as “a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity” (Exo 34:6). The expression “rich in kindness” (rab hesed) occurs a good number of times in the Old Testament (viz., Exo 34:6; Num 14:18; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; Psa 86:5, 15; 103:8). The term hesed can have several meanings in the Hebrew lexicon (HALOT): a) “Joint obligation between people; closeness, solidarity, loyalty” (Gen 24:27, 49; Deut 7:9, 12); b) “Lasting loyalty, faithfulness” (Gen 21:23; 1 Sam 15:6; Ruth 1:8); c) “God’s faithfulness, goodness, graciousness” (Exo 20:6; Psa 33:5; 2 Sam 9:3; Mic 7:18): d) “To remember, abounding in faithfulness” (Exo 34:6; Num 14:18; Psa 98:3; Jon 4:2); e) “The individual actions resulting from solidarity” (Gen 32:11; Isa 63;7; Lam 3:22).

Over all, hesed can be simply said as God’s faithfulness in his loyalty and kindness to his beloved.

Despite having a so-called “hot nose”, God is, nevertheless, portrayed as someone who has a “big heart”. The latter frequently overpowers the former, because his love for mankind is so great that it can consume any rage he might have against his people. Similarly, we are called to learn how to look always at the bigger picture of life, especially during moments when we lose our temper: the love that we share is way greater than any personal discomfort, mandating us to always forgive one another as God does to us many times over many generations.

- Rex Fortes, CM