Forest for the E’s
E—I sat and looked at the letter for several minutes. It was about six inches tall and a quarter inch thick. It was painted silver and mounted about an inch off a black wall. The light above cast a shadow against the black wall, which made the letter even more prominent. The five serifs (the little swoops at the end of letters in some fonts) were very striking. Father Edward Catich, in his book The Origin of the Serif, says it originated when Roman sculptures first painted what they wanted to engrave in stone. The brush stroke gave the accent, which developed into a style. The E was made of a smooth plastic, but it had an almost metallic look. Classy. Dignified. Professional.
The letter E, in English, has several possible sounds – nine, in fact: short e, long e, and who can forget the schwa? There are even more when combined with other letters. With a quick search, I found some other interesting facts. In Latin, it’s also the fifth letter and the second vowel. It’s the most commonly used letter in many languages, including Czech, English, Norwegian, and Swedish. The OED says E appears in around 11% of all common English words. An amazing letter, indeed.
But, by now, you’ve no doubt asked why was there a letter on the wall? I was sitting in a doctor’s office. The E was on the wall and was part of a whole series of letters that made up the office sign WEST VIRGINIA DERMATOLOGY. The point of the E I was looking at was to make the “eh” sound in West, but that still isn’t the reason it was there. The point was to communicate the business’s name. It may be interesting (probably not) to know about the size, shape, and color of the letter. It may be helpful, in some measure, to know the history of serifs and to ponder the schwa. But if that’s all I took away from it, am I getting the meaning? Am I getting deep, or just completely missing the point?
Word studies have their place when we read the Bible, study it, or preach or teach. When you don’t know what a word means, or if you notice a word repeated, it’s good to understand and think about the word. But the point is not to learn a word but to know why that word was chosen and what it has to do with everything else in the text. A word may be misunderstood or misused, so it’s good to get a better handle on the Biblical usage. But sometimes, looking too close at one word or sentence without considering what’s around it can cause you to miss the point. You can do a linguistical deep dive on “whosoever” in John 3:16 and still miss the point. Don’t forget the meaning of the message. Word studies should clarify the text, not obscure it. Be careful not to miss the forest for the E’s.
