Hesed, the Seed of the Biblical Story
- Biblical Studies & Commentaries
- Publisher: Baker Academic (Baker Publishing Group)
- Published: 2026
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Publisher's Description
The Hebrew word hesed is often translated as love, faithfulness, loyalty, or steadfastness of God, but it means so much more. Could hesed be the seed from which the diverse biblical story grows and expands? Traditionally, Old Testament theology has focused on key themes or a "center" around which to organize the Old Testament. These approaches may help unify the Old Testament, but they also ignore important material and simplify the Old Testament's complexity and diversity. As an alternative to a gravitational center that reduces, Jennifer M. Matheny's argument emphasizes possibilities as she posits that hesed is the relational seed from which the complex and diverse biblical story grows. In her accessibly written analysis, Matheny engages theologically with the Torah, Prophets, and Writings to trace hesed's relational impact through the Old Testament. Through stories, poems, and songs of broken covenants, war, and exile, Matheny also shows how violence and injustice reign when humanity fails to be keepers and doers of Yhwh's hesed, while justice and hope prevail when humanity chooses courageous acts of hesed. This fresh, introductory-level approach emphasizes the importance of story, complexity, and diversity--and how we do hesed to others and back to Yhwh.
Endorsements (6)
“This book is a testament to God's ever-reverberating love, which offers a new lens on the Old Testament as a whole. It should be required reading for every Old Testament theology course!”
“Decades after foundational works by Glueck and Sakenfeld, several scholars have returned to ponder anew the crucial but elusive Hebrew word ḥesed. In the present book, Jennifer Matheny adds her voice to this important discussion, finding in ḥesed not a center for Old Testament theology but a capacious seed that proves generative across the canon. Matheny covers a remarkable amount of (seeded) ground, putting readers in her debt in this helpful and thorough overview and analysis.”
“What if instead of trying to find a central theme that summarizes the entire Old Testament, we started from the idea of ḥesed (often translated 'loving-kindness' or 'steadfast love') and traced how both God and humans embodied this core value in action? Jennifer Matheny's heuristic proposal is that from this generative 'seed' the relational story of Scripture germinates through the diverse genres of the Old Testament, evident in the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings.”
“Jennifer Matheny provides an engaging and accessible analysis for ḥesed, which has become a familiar Hebrew word in both the church and academy. This book reenvisions the creative possibilities of ḥesed as a seed that communicates potential possibilities through story, poetry, and other texts found in the Old Testament. Her careful work traces the breadth and possibilities for understanding the diversity and complexity of this term within the fuller context of Scripture. A very helpful and inspiring read!”
“This is the book that the study of biblical theology needs today! Written with an engaging prose and infused with illustrative personal stories, Matheny's book carries forward the best of biblical theology's past (while skillfully sidestepping its shortfalls) in an approach that finds theological coherence across the Old Testament yet simultaneously honors—in fact, foregrounds—its rich and unsettled (and unsettling) intertextual diversity. Readers will benefit from Matheny's close readings of biblical texts and her creative proposals for how to connect them, which are methodologically sophisticated, accessible, and theologically generative.”
“Some of the most important ideas in Scripture cannot be pinned down but are instead the generative source of much that is good and beautiful in God's world. Ḥesed is like that, by Matheny's reckoning. Rather than it being a reductive primary theme, Matheny shows how ḥesed—both divine and human—helps unlock theological impulses in the Torah, Prophets, and Writings. Ḥesed is something to look at and see with!”
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