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YESTERDAY The following is an excerpt from the book The Living Words. The hand gesture, usually referred to as the "thumbs up," conveys the idea of "good" while the "thumbs down" means "bad." You are probably aware that these gestures have their origin in the gladiatorial games where Caesar would give one of these gestures to the conquering gladiator to convey his desire for the fate of the defeated, but you may not be aware of the original meanings behind these gestures. If Caesar gave the "thumbs up," which was actually pointing to the throat, and not up as we mistakenly think, it signaled the gladiator standing above the defeated to put his sword through the throat, to kill him. On the other hand, if he gave the "thumbs down" he is signaling the gladiator to throw his sword to the ground, to spare the defeated. As you can see, over the last two thousand years, the meanings of thumbs up and thumbs down have reversed in meaning. We have already seen a few examples of how different Hebrew thought is from our own Modern Greek way of thinking, but is it possible at times our modern way of thinking is opposite of Hebrew thought? Let’s look at an example that shows that it can be. In our way of recollecting time, we view time as a line or road. On this road the past—where we have already walked—is behind us, and the future—where we have not yet walked—is in front of us. If we examine some Hebrew words related to time, we can get a clue on how the Ancient Hebrews perceived the past and the future. The Hebrew word for tomorrow is מחר mahhar [H:4279] from the root אחר ahhar [H:309] meaning "to be behind." The Hebrew word for yesterday is תמול temol [H:4136] from the word מול mul [H:8543] meaning "in front." As you can see, in Hebraic thought, they perceived the past (yesterday) as in the front while the future (tomorrow) as behind. It is not that they saw themselves walking the road of time backwards—in fact, they did not see time as linear, but as cyclical. They perceived their history, the past, as events that can be seen, therefore in front, while the future cannot be seen. Therefore, it is behind and out of view. As directions are oriented to the east and the east is "in front," the word קדם qedem [H:6924] can mean east (in space) as well as the past (in time).