I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as I recently read about how G*d required his sacrifices to be salted. We can observe this from the following verse in The Torah:
“And every offering of your grain offering you shall season with salt; you shall not allow the salt of the covenant of your God to be lacking from your grain offering. With all your offerings you shall offer salt." - Leviticus 2:13
When we dig deep and research this, we can begin to understand what the spiritual significance of salt is and why it is so important. As we all know, physically salt makes food taste better and our body requires it to live. We don't need too much, as with anything else in this life, too much of anything is not good for us. The human body can't live without some sodium. It's needed to transmit nerve impulses, contract and relax muscle fibers (including those in the heart and blood vessels), and maintain a proper fluid balance.
So there is the scientific explanation of why we physically need salt. But why does Yeshua tell us that we are "the salt of the earth"?
"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its savor, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men." - Matthew 5:13
In order to achieve a deeper meaning of the spiritual significance of salt, let's break down the Hebrew in Leviticus 2:13. For this study, I'm going to focus on three main Hebrew words here, which translates to the the phrase "the Salt of the Covenant of Your God".
Melach ( מלח ) - the Salt
Berit ( ברית ) - of the Covenant
Elohekah ( אלהיך ) - of Your G*d
So right off, we can see that this Hebrew words phrase along signifies a binding obligation to G*d. Of course, we know that the word "covenant" can definitely be used to describe a "binding obligation". Not only between us and G*d, but also between G*d and us. We can observe how HaShem (The LORD) has made covenants with Israel throughout scripture. Here are a few examples:
The Rainbow as A Sign of G*d's Covenant:
I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.”
And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations:
I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth."
Genesis 9:11-13
Circumcision as a Symbol of G*d's Covenant:
"And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations.
This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised.
You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.
He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring,
both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant."
Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”
Genesis 17:9-14
The Torah (The Law) given to Moses was a Covenant:
"Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.
“You are standing today, all of you, before the LORD your God: the heads of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, all the men of Israel,
your little ones, your wives, and the sojourner who is in your camp, from the one who chops your wood to the one who draws your water,
so that you may enter into the sworn covenant of the LORD your God, which the LORD your God is making with you today,
that he may establish you today as his people, and that he may be your God, as he promised you, and as he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
Deuteronomy 29:9-13
And of course, the most important of them all, The New Covenant (which was fulfilled by The Blood of Yeshua, who took away the sin of the entire world):
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah,
not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD.
For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Now that we understand more about the word Berit ( ברית ) and about the "Covenant", defined as a binding obligation, let's break down the other two words; Melach ( מלח ) "Salt" and Elohekah ( אלהיך ) - "of Your G*d".
First we will briefly examine the word Elohekah ( אלהיך ), which is best translated as "of Your G*d". Hebrew is The Pure Language and the words are like building blocks. When you add a prefix or suffix to a word, it expands the meaning. For example, the word Shem ( שם ) means "Name". If we add a Hei ( ה ) to the front of the word, it means "The", so HaShem ( השם ) means "The Name". Which is the term that I often use in reference to The LORD (referring to the Tetragrammaton - which is the Sacred Four Letter Name of The LORD ( יהוה ) or YHVH), that I firmly believe that we shouldn't ever even try to pronounce. As it is made up of four consonants and no vowels were given. So the same goes with adding letters to the end of the word. So, you basically have a root word and then you can build onto it from either side, thus producing a phrase with just a single word.
Knowing that, we can see that the word Elohekah ( אלהיך ) is a form of the root word El ( אל ), which means "G*d. Understand that the Hebrew term many people know for G*d is Elohim, and this word is actually a plural form of the word for G*d...so that little bit of knowledge can unravel a whole other level of scriptural interpretation, yet I digress.
Now, trying my best to stay on topic, let's get back into the meaning of the word for Salt...finally. Melach ( מלח ) means "Salt" and it's interesting to note that this is very similar to the Hebrew word for "King" ( מלך ); only ( מלח ) as the word for "King" is pronounced with an "e" instead of an "a". So Melech is King and Malech is Salt. There are vowel points (Nikkudim) given on much of the Hebrew text that elaborate vowel sounds, but I'm not even going to begin to go into all that...or we'll never figure out what salt is.
In Hebrew, we can see the obvious connection between the words for King and Salt; Melech and Melach, respectively. One could even say that spiritually salt purifies our human nature and transforms us from a peasant to a king and I like that, as it bridges us to the following passage, that Paul tells us in his Letter to The Colossians:
"Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person." - Colossians 4:6
So, we can see that spiritually speaking, if we're lacking "salt", we're no longer favorable (or tasty) to HaShem. Yeshua tells us this, in his own perfect way, in the following:
"For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.” - Mark 9:49-50
As we have already seen from the commandment in Leviticus 2:13, regarding the requirement of Salt of all Sacrifices, The Salt of The Covenant is symbolic of the worshipper's pure intentions in upholding our end of the Covenant with G*d.
Of course, we can always break down the Hebrew word Salt (Melach - מלח ) numerically and learn some more deeper understanding of its spiritual significance.
The Gematria Value of Melach ( מלח ) is 78
78 is also the Numeric Value of the following words:
"The Living" ( המחייה )
"And From The Heart" ( ומלב )
"Sages" ( חכמי )
"His Grace" ( חסדו )
"And We Benefited" ( והטבנו )
"And Your Son" ( ובנך )
"And Sacrificed" ( ונזבחה ) -
"According To You" ( כלחך )
"Listened" ( האזינה )
"And Clung To" ( ונאחזו )
"Will Understand" ( יבינו )
"I Will Love" ( יאהבני )
You can almost make an entre sentence revealing The Father's most precious gift of Yeshua right there:
"According To You"
"And Your Son"
"The Living"
"And Sacrificed"
from
"His Grace"
"I Will Love"
and have
"Listened"
"And Clung To"
and
"Will Understand"
"And We Benefited"
from
"His Grace"
Also, just to top this one off, I think it is important to note that the numeric value of Melach ( מלח ) is 78, which 26 x 3.
26 is the Numeric Value of HaShem ( יהוה )
If you've been following any of my previous work, you will know by now that I have revealed how the number 3 is an extremely significant number to G*d, as it not only signifies what we as Christians know as the "Holy Trinity" (The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit) in Jewish Metaphysics, these three are Keter, Chochmah and Binah (Crown, Wisdom and Understanding); the Three Top Sefirot that never descended.
With of that being said, our "saltiness" is what makes us unique and special to HaShem. Just how our food without salt is tasteless and worthless, if we lose our salt we could become worthless as well, G*d Forbid.
May we never lose our saltiness, and just as Yeshua tells us always "have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”
Much Love and Blessings!
חסד ושלום עליכם והרבה אהבה וברכות
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