CAN YOU PASS THE HONEY PLEASE?
Psalm 119:103
How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
When Jesus was a little boy around six years old, He, and every other little six-year-old Jewish boy went to the local synagogue school called Bet Sefer. Bet Sefer means house of the book. From the days of Ezra a child usually attended Bet Sefer from age 6 to age 10. You would attend this school five days a week, Monday – Friday. There would be in the local synagogue a Torah teacher who would begin teaching you the Torah. Bet Sefer was the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy.
It is said that on the first day of class a rabbi would take honey and cover your slate, your personal chalk board, where you would write. Honey was a sign of God’s favor. There was nothing finer, nothing sweeter, nothing more full of pleasure than honey. Then he would say, “Now class, lick the honey off the slate and off your fingers.” And as you did this the rabbi would say, “May the words of God be sweet to your taste, sweeter than honey to your mouth” Psalm 119:103. How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
And so as a child you would be introduced to the Scriptures as there was nothing more enjoyable in the entire universe than tasting, receiving, accepting the words of God and making them a part of your life. This is how Jewish boys were introduced to the Scriptures. From ages 6-10 they would memorize Bet Sefer: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. By age 10 they had memorized those books and completed Bet Sefer.
We remember Jesus teaching in the temple at the age of twelve. The Rabbis we amazed that not only did he know the Bet Sefer, he also knew the Bet Midrash, Genesis – Malachi, the Torah.
We can see that Jesus knew the importance of the scriptures. Knowing God’s word brings peace, strength, and confidence. There are thousands of promises in the bible that God has for us. If we don’t know what they are, we cant walk in His benefits. How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth.
