The Kidneys and the Ears, “For You Have Possessed My Kidneys.”

“For thou hast possessed my kidneys: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb.” Psalm 139:13 JB. “I shall bless Lord Jehovah who counsels me and my kidneys teach me in the nights.” Psalm 16:7 AB.

I’m five or six years old, and it hurts to breathe. I’m feverish. The doctor puts his stethoscope on my chest and tells me to take a deep breaths, which is difficult. He removes his lighted earpiece and looks deep into my ear canal. He asked me if my ears hurt. I answer in shallow rasps. As he peers, he says something to me that today seems humorous. He says, “What have you been planting in there, corn or potatoes?” I sink down and become embarrassed that I have dirty ears. Forget that I’m dying. Not really, but you get the gist of the situation.

I was ashamed that I wasn’t clean. Of course, as I type this, I realize I have often had dirty ears. Yes, ears crammed and packed full of potatoes. He tells my mother I have asthmatic pneumonia; while I sit wondering in childlike fashion, what is growing inside my ear canal.

As I write this blog, my husband has eczema and is currently dealing with an itching ear–his left. I ponder a swab of olive oil on a Q-tip to soothe this. Later, I wondered if perhaps peroxide would bubble up and lessen the itch. After a week of constant irritation, today the doctor has sent out steroid drops to soothe this issue. I will close this blog with a scripture about itching ear words.

We have two ears and two kidneys. Hearing the most profound truth is attributed to the kidneys: “The Kidneys give advice” (Babylonian Talmud, Chulin 11a). Ancient Chinese medicine also connects the kidneys with the ears and our ability to hear.

Our ears and our kidneys look very similar. Slice a kidney in half, and you get this.

We hear, but we do not listen. We talk, but we do not choose our words carefully.

The prophet explains our condition: “You are near in their mouth but far from their kidneys” (Jeremiah 12:2 ISR). Our Bible translators have replaced the word kidney with rein or heart and often as inward parts, but kidneys were the original wording. It was the sweet fat of the sacrifices. Our kidneys purify us. They separate the good from the bad.

“The position of the kidneys in the body makes them particularly inaccessible, and in cutting up an animal, they are the last organs to be reached. Consequently, they were a natural symbol for the most hidden part of a man (Psalm 139:13), and in Job 16:13 to “cleave the reins asunder” is to affect the total destruction of the individual (compare Job 19:27 Lamentations 3:13). This hidden location, coupled with the sacred sacrificial use, caused the kidneys to be thought of as the seat of the innermost moral (and emotional) impulses.” For more info on this topic click here.

“The Sages teach that:

1. The kidneys advise us on what to do.
2. ALL cognitive functions relating to making decisions occur in the heart and kidneys.
3. NOTHING relating to this occurs in the brain. (see too Midrash Tehillim 14)
4. One kidney advises to do good, one to do evil (this is presumably intended literally, since it is stated immediately next to the statement about the function of the organs).
5. When God wants to judge whether we are good or not, He examines the heart and kidneys, not the brain.”

 

During the Jewish morning praises, there is a prayer called Nishmat or the breath of every living thing…It says this:

“For every mouth is in acknowledgement to You, and every tongue swears to You, and every knee bows to You, and every erect spine prostrates itself to You, and all hearts fear You, and all innards and kidneys praise Your Name, as it is written, “All my bones say, Who is like You, O God.”

Our kidneys AND BONES praise Him!

Science has discovered that hearing loss and moderate kidney disease are connected. Our kidneys filter our blood and remove toxins which go into our bladder and are excreted from our bodies. When they don’t work right, they can damage nerves and yes, hearing. Our Creator is perfect and each organ functions to cause a complete and perfect body. May His Body begin to function in the Spirit of truth, unity, and complete harmony as 1^st Corinthians 12.

Our ears are like our hearts. Our hearts need the flesh cut off, and so do our ears.

“To whom shall I speak and give warning That they may hear? Behold, their ears are closed–And they cannot listen. Behold, the word of the LORD has become a reproach to them; They have no delight in it” (Jeremiah 6:10).

I once had a friend who would try and show me scriptures that I could not see. She spoke words that I could not hear. I heard her mouth moving and enunciating the scriptures, but someone had already stood in front of me year after year proclaiming a different picture. Her words were not worth hearing.

I knew more. Her exhausted facial features expressed how ‘put out’ she was with me not hearing and receiving. No matter how hard she tried to open the verses up to me, I had dirty ears. I had potatoes in my ears. My kidneys and heart were not open to hearing her. I had kidney issues. I had heart issues. I had a pride issue.

This woman had no doctorate degree. She was sick. She wasn’t wealthy. Matter a fact she was quite the opposite. She wasn’t going to ‘church’ every week. I had been taught by men behind pulpits that sickness, poverty, and issues that were not positive were due to a person’s sins. They were out of church. They were perhaps not tithers. They were ignorant. Her explanations on His Feast & Sabbaths were interesting, but why would I listen to someone like her? She was in bondage. I was free (Sarcasm). James tells us to be quick to listen, but are we? Are we quicker to listen to those we esteem?

Last week, I walked out of our meeting, and the car parked next to ours had a license plate that said, “Listen.” This week’s Torah portion is not listen but Va’era which means “I appeared.” However, listening is the main theme of this portion. The Israelites would not listen to Moses. He had uncircumcised lips. Pharaoh would not listen. He had an uncircumcised heart.

“But Moses spoke before the LORD, saying, “Behold, the sons of Israel have not listened to me; how then will Pharaoh listen to me, for I am unskilled in speech?” Exodus 6:12. Verse nine explains why their ears were shut. “Moses told this to the Israelites, but they did not listen to him because of their broken spirit and hard labor.” HCS.

Sometimes we have been through so much hell even a morsel of hope is not accepted.

When Yeshua spoke, many picked up stones. When Stephen spoke the people put their fingers in their already dirty ears, and they too picked up stones. Stephen told the complete Biblical account and ended with this…

“You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did. “Which one of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? They killed those who had previously announced the coming of the Righteous One, whose betrayers and murderers you have now become; you who received the law as ordained by angels, and yet did not keep it” (Acts 7:51-53 NASB).

“He who turns away his ear from listening to the law (instructions), Even his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).

The prophet Isaiah when asked who will go to these people with hard hearts, says,  “Here am I. Send me!”

He said, “Go, and tell this people: ‘Keep on listening, but do not perceive; Keep on looking, but do not understand.’ “Render the hearts of this people insensitive, Their ears dull, And their eyes dim, Otherwise they might see with their eyes, Hear with their ears, Understand with their hearts, And return and be healed” (Isaiah 6:9-10 NASB).

Be healed from what? Diabetes? MS? Pneumonia?

No, something far worse. Kidney disease.

I’m going to close this blog with ears that itch. They itch to hear things. What type of things? Blessings, prosperity, honor of men, fame, mansions and everything good. No correction, no suffering, no poverty, no humbleness, nothing that would cause an ounce of repentance… only itching ear words that no matter how hard you scratch, cannot be soothed because the flesh is never satisfied.

“Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry” (II Timothy 4:2-5).

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Sources:

photo: Bonnie Manning

https://hods.org/pdf/The%20Question%20of%20the%20Kidneys%20Counsel.pdf

Biblehub.com

http://www.rationalistjudaism.com/2010/05/kidney-summary.html