Emunah Means Faithfulness

“The biblical word emunah, usually translated as “faith,” does not mean this at all. It is not a cognitive attribute, meaning something you believe to be true. It belongs to an entirely different sphere of discourse. It is a moral attribute and means faithfulness, as in a marriage. Faith in the Hebrew Bible is the story of a love – the love of God for creation, for humanity, and for a particular family, the children of Abraham, a love full of passion but one that is not always, or even often, reciprocated. Sometimes, as in the Mosaic books, it is described like the relationship between a parent and a child. At other times, particularly in the prophetic literature, it is envisaged as the love between a husband and an often faithless wife. But it is never less than love.”

Essays on Ethics, pp. xxvii-xxviii