Exodus 33: 12-23 (links validated 9/5/23)

The Hebrew word for glory is kavod. Like many of the best Hebrew words — shalom, hesed — it evades translation into just one English word. It is translated at times as glory, honor and presence. However, its literal meaning is “weightiness.” I wonder if you can think of an experience that felt weighty in your life? All of mine seem attached to audacious promises: my wedding, my ordination, the adoption of our son. As a pastor, I felt it at baptisms, around the communion table, at graveside services. Each of these bears weight though, strangely, I would not say it is burdensome. In the final scene of Gary Schmidt’s young adult book, The Wednesday Wars, the main character, Holling, attends his best friend’s Bar Mitzvah. He describes the way Danny put on his great-uncle’s prayer shawl, winding the tefillin on his arm and forehead, stepping up to the scroll, bringing it to the pulpit and then Danny began to chant. Holling describes it like this: “Right there in front of us, Danny Hupfer was no longer Danny who stuck wads of gum under his desk. Or Danny who screamed out of his skull at soccer games. Or Danny who ran cross-country on bloody knees and waved sweaty T-shirts. He was more than all of those things. He sang the words, and he was everyone who had sung them before him, like he was taking up his place in this huge choir…God Himself leading the music. You saw Danny covered with weight...

“I really want to see you, Lord,” to quote George Harrison’s song, “My Sweet Lord.” (George was my favorite Beatle. He had a quiet spiritual side in songs like “Here Comes the Sun” and “All Things Must Pass.”). He wrote these lyrics in 1970 while experimenting with Gospel music and Hare Krishna chants. By alternating “Hallelujahs” with Krishna chants, he wanted to show the oneness among spiritual traditions. This synthesis didn’t age well since the Hari Krishnas had rampant sex scandals and racketeering charges. But now, doesn’t everyone have racketeering and sex scandals? “My Sweet Lord” was the number-one song in America for the four weeks leading up to Christmas in 1970. That was the year of the Kent State student shooting. In the Spring, students from 900 schools walked out in protest of the Vietnam War. Racial tensions led to fires and shootings in Daytona Beach, Florida. The troubles deepened in Northern Ireland as car bombings became a tactic. As Harrison topped the charts, a powerful cyclone killed 300,000 people in Bangladesh. When “My Sweet Lord” was number one, the United States and the Soviet Union conducted two nuclear tests each in Nevada and Siberia. Workers went on strike in the Gdansk shipyard in Poland, and soldiers killed 26 workers in two separate incidents. Unemployment rose to 5.8 percent. No wonder Harrison sang, “I really want to see you, Lord.”...

When I was in tenth grade, our high school’s boys’ basketball team advanced to the quarterfinals of the state high school tournament. While our team lost, many of us thought that we ought to celebrate what we called a “glory day” by skipping school the next day in honor of the team’s amazing tournament run. While I’m not sure students celebrate such “glory days” any more, my memories got me to thinking about the concept of “glory days.” While I attended a Christian high school, I don’t think anyone thought of our glory day as giving glory to God. Mostly, I think, we thought of it as an excuse to skip school. If any glory was to be had, it was that of the members of our team. Perhaps there was also an element of our “glorying in,” that is, celebrating the Eagles’ accomplishment.

Moses demands that God show him God’s glory. He wants more. You get the sense that Moses wants to control the relationship. Is this not true of us as well. Do we not make demands on God that might be presumptuous? Show me your glory. In other words, I want to see you face to face. What you’ve shown me to this point is insufficient. God agrees to show him the glory and goodness of God. The name of God—Yahweh—will be proclaimed. God is willing to go a long way with Moses, but God cannot reveal God’s face to Moses, lest he be consumed...

Scroll down the page for these reflections.

("'Glory' in Greek is doxa, from which we get "doxology". It is the standard term to refer to the shining holiness and grandeur of God. 'Glory' refers to the punch of God's presence. God has so much power, is so very holy, and exudes so strongly all that is right and true that you cannot miss his presence....")

("Gibran says, 'Our children are not "our children". They are sons and daughters of life's longing for itself. They come through us but not from us...")

("'Glory' in Greek is doxa, from which we get doxology. It is the standard term to refer to the shining holiness and grandeur of God. Glory refers to the punch of God's presence. God has so much power, just is so very holy, and exudes so strongly all that is right and true that you cannot miss his presence...")