Hosanna in the highest
Matthew 21:9
The day Jesus arrived in the ancient city of Jerusalem, there’ was singing, shouting, dancing, even laying down branches and garments in the street in front of the donkey Jesus rode on.
Of special interest is this foreign word, "Hosanna." What does the word mean? We use it as a praise expression, much like we would say "Hallelujah," or "Praise the Lord," but doing so may cause us to miss the underlying meaning.
The word is of Hebrew origin, formed from two words, "yashaw" and "naw".
The first of these two words is familiar to us because it stands behind the name of Jesus. The angel who instructed Joseph, explained that Mary’s baby should have the name "Yeshua," ". . . because he will save his people from their sins." (Matthew 1:21) The word has a variety of possible translations: "help, liberate, preserve," literally, "make open, wide or free."
Jeremia 31:7
Psalm 86:2
The last syllable of our word "hosanna", "naw", is a primitive particle of incitement and entreaty, which may be rendered: "I pray now."
Together these two words form a prayer, "Help, or save now, I (we) pray."
In the New Testament, "hosanna" is only found in relation to this story - the Triumphal Entry celebrated on Palm Sunday. However, even though this Hebrew word may sound strange to our ears, it was well known to Jewish worshipers, having been taken right out of their worship book:
"This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. O LORD, save us; O LORD, grant us success. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD. From the house of the LORD we bless you." (Psalm 118:24-26)
Please note that this Psalm was recited as the procession of worshipers would approach the temple, quite possibly it was customary for pilgrims to chant this Psalm as they came to the temple at Passover time. However, this time, something is different, the worshippers are not merely going through the annual ritual, they are projecting these words toward the One who sits on the donkey, Jesus, the Savior. How do we know that? Well, because the religious leaders clearly understood that’s what was happening, and so they tried to stop what they thought to be blasphemy. In support of His own identity as the Son of God, the Messiah, Jesus not only refused to quiet the praise, but added that if they stopped, the stones would make up for their lack - the Lord must be praised, and Jesus is Lord!
"Save now, we pray!" they chanted loudly, "Hosanna!"
Even more closely related to the term "hosanna", are two Old Testament passages where we hear people use this word when making a plea before their King. The first is a story which appropriately comes from the reign of King David.
Joab, who held a position equivalent to Secretary of Defense in David’s administration, noticed that the King missed his son Absalom who was in hiding after having killed his half brother, Amnon, in revenge for the rape of Absalom’s sister Tamar. So Joab concocted this scheme to get David to allow his son to return safely to Jerusalem. Finding a woman who would be good at acting the part of a grieving widow and mother, Joab dressed her in mourning clothes and sent her on a mission to King David. When she approached the King, she cried out, "Hosanna" - "Help me, O king!" (II Samuel 14:4) Then she spun her tale of woe, telling the King that her husband was dead, and in a fight, one of her sons killed the other son and now the town was demanding that the surviving son, her only remaining hope for support, be handed over to be executed.
King David was moved by this story and prepared an order to be sent back to the town to spare the life of this widow’s son, when the woman gave up her play acting and appealed to the King to bring back his own son, Absalom, who had been banished. David then realized that it was Joab who was behind this scheme and sent him to bring Absalom back to Jerusalem, although the glad reunion would wait another two years until Absalom was able to convince Joab to get the King to invite him back into his presence.
Obviously, the reason we’re looking at this story is because of the plea of the woman seeking help from the King, words similar to those shouted by the crowds entering the city with Jesus. Some may be bothered by Joab’s use of deception, even though he believed he was only bringing about what the King really wanted, reconciliation with his son. However, this methodology was common in that era, as seen in the story of God’s Prophet, Nathan, using the story of the rich man taking the poor man’s lamb when David needed to be confronted with his sin with Bathsheba.
What we want to see is that the use of this expression, "Hosanna" comes from one who is desperate, having a need or problem which absolutely requires the intervention of the King. The woman in the story can only be "saved" by the King. The faithful pilgrims who lined Jerusalem’s streets one week prior to Passover called out with the same urgency. While perhaps they could only long for a political kind of salvation, deliverance from the oppressive regime of the Roman Emperor, we now can make an even more accurate application, and cry out for deliverance from the most oppressive regime of all, that of Satan.
Do notice that when this woman approached the King she fell on her face, even as we do when we call out for salvation from sin and worship the Savior. David, the King, represents God who is also deeply concerned with the distressing situations of His subjects, and He is also pleased when the story concludes with a reconciliation of the King with His sons and daughters.
There’s another story from a later time in Israel’s history, recorded in II Kings 6, an event which took place during the time of famine when Samaria was surrounded by an enemy army.
The people in Samaria had become desperate with starvation, and as the King of Israel, Joram son of Ahab ". . . was passing by on the wall, a woman cried to him, ’Help me, my lord the king!’" (v.26) Once again we have an example of this expression, "Hosanna."
Notice that the King’s first response was, "If God can’t help, how can I?" But then, thinking better of it, he asked, "What’s the matter?" Then we hear a horrible account of two women who agreed to cannibalize their young sons; one had been killed, cooked and eaten, now the mother whose child was still alive refused to keep her part of the bargain. Hearing that, the King tore his garment, showing sackcloth underneath. Looking for someone to blame, he sent for the prophet Elisha who foretold the breaking of the siege. The story concludes with four lepers leaving the city to throw themselves on the mercy of the enemy only to find that because God had confused the enemy army, they had fled, leaving all their belongings behind.
But again, the message we’re hearing is the same, in a time of desperation, it is appropriate to cry out to the King, "Hosanna" - "Save now, we pray!"
In the first story, the King’s son needed to be delivered from the judgment of death and the incarceration of his exile. In this second story, a whole city needed to be liberated. In both cases, the cry was the same, picked up again on the streets of Jerusalem hundreds of years later, "Hosanna" - "Save now, we pray!"
The context of “hosanna” in the Gospels makes it clear, however, that the Gospel writer means something different from “help, please” or “save, please.” It would make no sense to say “Save, please, to the Son of David.” The fact is the Gospel writer himself did not understand the meaning of hosanna. How did this occur?
The original Hebrew, from which Matthew is quoting the welcome given to Jesus on his entry into Jerusalem, read (or was spoken) like this: “Hosanna l- the Son of David.” The Gospel writer misunderstood the particle l-, which is attached to the title “the Son of David” in the original Hebrew. L- commonly means “to” or “for,” The Gospel writer therefore rendered this: “Hosanna to the Son of David.”
Obviously, if l- were translated “to,” “hosanna” in this context could not mean “save, please” or “help, please.” Not knowing what “hosanna” meant, the Gospel writer simply transliterated “hosanna” without translating it.
The error, however, is that in this case the particle l- does not mean “to.” Whoever translated the original Hebrew (or Aramaic) text into Greek was unaware that the particle l- sometimes has another function. It can also be used as a vocative, to indicate a form of address. In this sense, we can translate it simply as “O,” as in “Hosanna, O Son of David.” Once we realize that l- can indicate the vocative, it makes perfectly good sense to translate the line “Help, please, O Son of David.”
What do we do, however, with the second use of “hosanna’ in the Palm Sunday passage from Matthew: “Hosanna, in the highest.”
Here again we must reconstruct the original Hebrew from the Greek. The Greek is “Hosanna en hypsistois. This line is usually translated “Hosanna in the highest.” (“Hosanna” is simply transliterated.) What was the original Hebrew that has been rendered hypsistois? There are two likely possibilities: (1) ‘ElyoÆn, which is an epithet of God, usually translated “Most High” or “The Highest One’ (Greek Hypsistos); or (2) ‘ElyoÆniÆn, the plural of ‘ElyoÆn, which was in common use in Aramaic at the time of Jesus. This royal plural was not really meant as a plural, but, like the royal “we,” was intended to signify majesty or excellence. ‘ElyoÆniÆn is found in four places in Aramaic in the Book of Daniel (Daniel 7:18, 22, 25, 27).6
Preceding ‘ElyoÆn or ‘ElyoÆniÆn in the original Hebrew was doubtless the particle l-. Here again the Gospel writer failed to understand it as a vocative, so he translated it “in the highest.” If he had properly understood the vocative as indicating a form of address, he would have properly translated it as “O, Most High.” He would then have been able to translate “hosanna” instead of transliterating it. The verse should have been translated: “Save, please, O Most High.”
Let us now look at the second line of the Palm Sunday welcome from Matthew 21:9, for that too contains a misunderstanding. As it is usually translated, it reads, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” We know of no liturgical formula in any ancient writing that speaks of “coming in the name of the Lord.” What is common is to be blessed in the name of the Lord, Moreover, in the context of our verse, it makes no sense to “come in the name of the Lord”; the misunderstanding resulted from a poetic variation in the normal or customary word order. Because of the poetic inversion of word order the translator rendered: “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” instead of correctly translating it, “Blessed in the name of the Lord is he who comes.”
In sum, a proper understanding of the Palm Sunday welcome of Jesus from Matthew 21:9 is as follows:
“Help [or save], please, O Son of David.
Blessed in the name of the Lord is he who comes.
Help [or save], please, O Most High.”
