2 June | Youth
«The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy.» Psalm 103:8
According to the Guinness Book, the biggest nose in the world belongs to a 72-year-old Turkish man called Mehmet Ozyurek. Since 2001, he has maintained an impressive mark of 8.8 centimeters in length and does not even consider having a nose job! When asked about this “great privilege,” Ozyurek answers that he loves his nose and feels “immensely blessed to have a greater ability to perceive smells.”
In Jewish thought, several parts of the human body are related to some type of emotion, including the nose. The heart, for example, is considered the headquarters of love. The mind, in turn, is related to reason. The intestine has to do with human desires. How about the nose? In the Hebrew language, “nose” can also be translated as “wrath” ('aph). This is interesting because, when a person gets angry, their nose becomes red. There is even an idiomatic expression in Hebrew that says: “His nose was hot,” meaning he was angry. Thus, the length of an individual's nose illustrated their ability to control anger.
You have certainly seen someone upset. The impression it gives is that the person's nose turns into a chimney full of smoke, like in cartoons. Have you ever been huffing and puffing with anger? The best advice in these times is to take a deep breath. This way, the “nose” will return to its normal state.
When the Bible describes God, it does so in anthropomorphic and anthropopathic terms, that is, using human forms and emotions. The Creator is presented as having a head, arms, feet, heart and also a nose. Likewise, He has emotions similar to ours. When revealing Himself to Moses, the Lord declared that He was “merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth” (Exod 34:6). It is as if God is saying, “Moses, I have a ‘long nose.’ I do not get angry easily. I am patient with you.”
This expression of mercy evokes the divine covenant and reminds us that the Lord is longsuffering toward us, for He loves us. This does not mean, however, that we can play with God's patience, because, despite being enormous, it has a limit!