Dabar

Dabar in Hebrew means word/thing, or word and deed. It’s a fulfilling word, a word of action, a command. It means to formalize, arrange, to deliberately establish and pronounce something, like in the phrase we hear at weddings: “I now pronounce you husband and wife”. Dabar creates something. A new order of things. It carries transformative power. It executes what has been spoken.

Dabar is the entirety of God’s word. God spoke the world into being with His dabar, His command. When magicians pull a rabbit out of their hat they say “abrakadabra”, which is believed to originate from the Hebrew phrase “Ebrah k’dabri” which literally means “I create as I speak”, derived from the verb dabar.

Another noun derived from this same root is dvir which means sanctuary, inner sanctum, the Holy of Holies, the inner part of the temple, the Holiest place, where we meet and speak with God in intimate devotion, face to face (or mouth to mouth as it literally translates).

In the story of Mephiboshet (2 Sam 9) we encounter a negative form of the word dabar. Mephiboshet was a grandson of Saul, lame in both feet and he lived in Lo-Debar, which can be translated: A Place of Nothing, No Word, No Thing or No Pasture.
This illustrates for us that dabar, on the other hand, is a place of pasture, satisfaction and fulfillment. He is our place of Pasture. We feed on His word like honey, rich and sweet. Lo and behold, the word for bee in Hebrew is d’vorah from dabar, referring to the bee’s orderly motion. The honey the bees produce is a picture for His word – extremely nutrient and life giving.

In Hebrew language every letter is a word picture. Dabar (D-B-R) has three pictures (since the vowels are silent).

Dalet is the picture of a door. ד
Bet is the picture of a house. ב
Resh is the picture of a head.ר

Bet and Resh together spell bar, which means son in Aramaic.

So the word dabar means The Door to the Son. All through the Bible, the word of God, the mystery of Christ is sprinkled in. He sums it all up. It all points to him. He’s the end goal.

Jesus is God’s Dabar, the word made flesh, the essence and living expression of God (John 1:14).

He is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets. He is love and truth in concentrated form. He’s the word, the executing power that holds together the universe.