Jots and Tittles

I picked up some interesting new information today: I had, somewhere along the line, been taught that a jot was the dot over a 'j', an iota was the dot over an 'i' and a tittle was the cross-bar of a 't.' I have actually argued with people that wanted to tell me that a jot was the dot over an 'i,' but, to be honest, up until today, I never actually looked it up. Jesus made reference to a jot and a tittle in Matthew 5:18, and I think that's where most of us picked up those terms. To be honest, it doesn't make any sense for Him to refer to the dot over a 'j,' since there is no letter j in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Latin. When the translators were translating the Bible into English, they used terms that would be familiar to people (in 1611, anyway), but what Jesus was actually referring to were marks in the Hebrew language that assisted with pronunciation--in other words, you could still get the meaning without those marks, they just made it easier to read.

Anyway, I saw this on the Just Free Stuff blog, and almost protested that they had the definition of the word 'tittle' wrong (see # 4), but I decided that I should look it up first. Turns out, I was wrong. The tittle is the dot over the 'i,' and a jot and an iota are the same thing--almost nothing. I'm glad I decided to check myself; I don't even remember who gave me those (erroneous) definitions of jot, iota, and tittle, but it was somebody I felt I had good reason to trust (I trust everybody. It's the devil inside them I don't trust).

In any case, Jesus' point was that we, as Christians, are responsible for every last detail in God's Word. Now, that doesn't mean that we are responsible for making sure people outside our faith are obeying God's Word, as I've seen happen all too often. We need to live a life of Christian example, but leave others to do what they will. If all they ever get from us is condemnation, they won't come to us--they will stay away from us, or attack us at every opportunity. "I'm not afraid of being attacked," you say, but, it's hard to share the love of Jesus with someone who despises you. Particularly if you've given them good reason to want you gone. "I'm not afraid of persecution," you say. There's a difference between persecution and stupi-cution. Jesus said to be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. We have to be just as smart and as clever as those who would come against the message, but, at the same time, understand that people who attack us are not our enemies; they are victims. Our job is to rescue them. We can't do that by pushing them away. That puts us in a difficult position--we are trying to help people who don't understand that they need our help. Some of them really just wish we would go away (a lot of that is because of the actions of Christians who were not wise as serpents). We can't just be like Jonah, and sit on the side, waiting for God to destroy Ninevah because they really deserve it. We all deserve it--God's mercy has saved us from the fire, and He is depending on us to help share His grace with others. That's what we're here for.