ALPHA MAAMA (A.M.)

 Tusite ‘Okatopa 3, 2023

Skin or Scroll of Tears? 

Hiki tohi / fa’o hina ‘a e lo’imtata

PSALM 56:8

YOU HAVE KEPT COUNT OF MY TOSSINGS: PUT MY TEARS IN YOUR BOTTLE. ARE THEY NOT IN YOUR BOOK?

SAAME 56:8

Ko ‘eku ‘āunoa ni ‘oku fakalau ‘e he ‘Afiona – ‘Ē, ke ke ‘ai hoku lo‘imata ki ho‘o hina na–

‘Ikai ‘oku tu‘u ‘i ho‘o tohi na?

‘Oku ke lau ‘a ‘eku ‘alu fano be: ke ke ‘utu hoku gaahi lo‘imata ki ho‘o hina: ‘ikai ‘oku nau tu‘u ‘i ho‘o tohi? (UESI)

In this verse, "kept count" (safar) and "book" (sefer) are from the same root. A scribe would safar in a sefer - that is, "write down in a writing down object." God is imaged as a celestial scribe, making marks in his scroll of compassion, tallying up tears. The middle phrase has been translated as "put my tears in your bottle" (ESV) but also as "list my tears on your scroll" (NIV). Why? A nod is a leather bottle or skin, used to hold liquids such as wine (Josh. 9:4) or milk (Judg. 4:19). But since leather was also used for scrolls, and the rest of the verse refers to scrolls and writing, perhaps David meant, “List my tears on your leather [scroll]." Whether our Lord inks our tears onto his scroll or (more likely) bottles them in a skin, the message is consistent: his compassion toward us is so precise that not one miniscule drop of our liquidized pain passes by him unnoticed.

"Even the hairs of your head are all numbered," Jesus adds (Matt. 10:30). And we shouldn't be surprised. With God, we are never mere objects or numbers; each of us is minutely known and individually loved, with whole books in heaven written about us.

We praise you, dear Father, for you knitted us together in our mothers' wombs (Ps. 139:13).