ARAMAIC WORD STUDY – STAND IN OPPOSITION – QOM LOQEVAL  קוב לוקבל  Qop Vav Beth   Lamed Vav Qop Beth Lamed

James 4:7: “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”

I honestly do not advocate that we substitute the Aramaic for the Greek in our study of the New Testament.  All I am saying is that we study the New Testament with the Greek and Aramaic together.  You see if the writers were disciples of Jesus, as the Book of James, is believed to be, that they most likely were not fluent in Greek if they even understood Greek at all.  Their words would have had to be spoken in Aramaic to a scribe who translated it into the Greek.  The Greek is a very precise language, the language of scientist and mathematicians.  Aramaic is a very ambiguous language which makes it very hard to translate into another language like the Greek or even the English.  When writing in Aramaic one word may carry many different nuances to the writer where Greek is pretty much straight forward. Most of our theology is drawn from the Greek New Testament because it is a precise language.  Much of our knowledge of the nature of God is drawn from the Old Testament because Hebrew and Aramaic are a poetic language. We can only understand God in a poetic sense as He is a spirit and His realm is the spirit realm which we cannot fully comprehend in our natural state. 

We learned in our Weekly Torah Portion that when Moses died it was according the to Word of God.  That is how we would translate it in our Modern Technological precise English.  But Hebrew is poetic not scientific.  Thus, the literal rending is that Moses died upon the mouth or lips of God.  As Moses passed from this world God gave Him a Divine kiss. Now I ask you, would you not prefer to pass from this life with a Divine Kiss rather than according to the Word of God?  But then you may just be the scientific type and you are perfectly ok with dying according to the Word of God. 

Anyways, James 4:7 is really translated quite accurately from the Greek in every Modern translation that I read.  But in the Aramaic it is a little more expressive. “Stand in opposition to the adversary and he will flee in agony.”  The Aramaic word  for resist is qom loqaval which means to stand in opposition against something or someone.  To stand, be defiant and stand your ground.  If you do the devil will flee from you. 

The Greek word for flee is pheugo and you may have heard the teaching that the preposition aph with the genitive of a person would suggest running away in fear.  The Aramaic is not too far removed from that.  The word for flee in Aramaic is ‘aram which  is similar to the Hebrew word ‘aram which means to break or be cunning or subtle.  Actually, the Mem in Aramaic would most likely be a Sade in Hebrew as we learned in our Aramaic class.  Hence the word ‘aram in Aramaic would me to flee in terror or fear. 

The word satana in Aramaic means the accuser.  Hence when the enemy comes to accuse us we can stand up to this accusation because of the blood of Jesus.  So, when you are praying to God for help or any other request, the enemy whispers in your ear: “Just who do you think you are to be asking God for anything after the way you acted or the sins you’ve committed.  Come on, be reasonable already, God will not listen to you after all the things you (I caused you) did.”  But he knows as well as you should know that those sins are covered by the blood of Jesus.  So, you just need to turn to the enemy, point your finger at him and say: “You are a liar, those things have been covered and cleansed by the blood of Jesus. All you have are lies but I know I stand pure before God so He will hear and answer my prayers. “  Thus, the enemy can only flee from you. He will also flee in terror because standing right with you is the very one who shed His blood for you.