Bible Words

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by RM260boy

i am not one who is known for quoting the bible, but i do enjoy reading it, and when i have come accross something that is confusing or contraversial i like to try to find out what is behind the translation. one i have been trying to find out with little success is one of the clobber passages as to why the hebrew word ish (often used with the companion word ishah) is used as to the other words for man/kind

Originally Posted by RM260boy

two other words i have found that could have been used is zukar or ha-adama, pardon any mispelling of those words i have very little exposure to hebrew

Originally Posted by RM260boy

not quite greek i don't think.. from what i can tell ish means more of "holy male", male dedicated to god, or husband. the last especially when used with ish-ah.

Originally Posted by BrentRichards

ish/isha are, in my limited understanding, relatively generic. They are the words used in the Creation account, for example. However, the Levitical prohibitions mix the words, using both ish and zakur (in Lev. 20, Lev. 18 uses only zakur):

A man (ish) who lies with a man (zakur) as one lies with a woman (isha)...

You are right to observe that this juxtaposition is intriguing, but I'm not prepared to make much of it without some convincing ... the formula "If a man (ish)" begins most of the verses in the context. My first assumption would be that it was merely a literary style choice, with the switch to zakur perhaps hearkening back to the language of Chapter 18.

However, it is zakur that seems to have passed into the rabbinic tradition ... a fragment of the prohibition "mishkav zakur" (the lyings of a man) or "mishkav bzakur" (lying with a man) seem to have become virtually theological technical terms to refer to whatever practice is in view here. For a nice non-technical discussion of this, Robin Scroggs is worth a read (actually, he's well worth a read! His focus is NT, "The New Testament and Homosexuality" --but he covers Leviticus and 1st century Judaism as background)

My very limited opinion. Andy is away for a few days, but should arrive shortly after return with the real story.

I'm baaaack!

First, Rufus, you have to understand that I'm a geek. If it seems that I might enjoy a discussion about Hebrew words, or Greek for that matter, too damn much - I DO. If your eyes start rolling back in your head, or brain numbness sets in, just tell me to shut up. Okay?

So first, iysh (ish is fine, though)means man or husband (although husband in the sense we know it was unknown in those times - it is more the sense of male mate). Likewise, ishah (with an extended "sh" sound) means woman or wife (female mate).

zacar means male and n'qebah means female.

a'nashim means men/husbands (plural of iysh) and nashim means women/wives.

Then you get to adam (which would actually be pronounced more like ahdahm not Adam, but that may be just too damn picky), which is an interesting departure. While many, many texts translate adam inconsistently and intermittently as Adam and man, the NRSV is the closest to being right (sometimes) in the few instances when it uses "human" or "humankind".

In hebrew ha or h' before a word denotes the definite article, "the". So haadam means "the human" or, oddly enough, "the humans". You see, adam is a collective noun - which means that it refers not to a specific individual, but more correctly to generic person(s) - since it has not plural or feminine forms.

I did a study, for a women's conference on inclusive language, on the translations of adam through the ages. It occurs 17 times in the first two chapters of Genesis, while iysh occurs twice.

In the Septuagint (or Old Testament in Greek) adam was translated as the proper name Adam 7 times and as a form of anthropos the rest. anthropos means human (genderless).

In the Vulgate (Latin) adam was translated once as vir (man), 9 times as hominem or hominus (human) and 6 times as the proper name Adam.

In English, it gets interesting, but suffice it to say that the KJV uses the proper name Adam 4 times and "man" the others, the NIV uses Adam once and "man" the others, and the NRSV uses "human" or "humankind" 4 times and the rest "man". In the NRSV, Adam (as a name) doesn't show up until chapter 4.

The switch away from using words to convey the sense of "human" as opposed to "man" occurred in the late Middle English translations (Tyndale et al) in the early 1500's.

[andrewlittle]

For initial discussion on the Leviticus use of iysh or ish, zacar and ishah, maybe you could check out the post below.

http://www.soulforce.org/forums/show...1&postcount=53

Then we could go from there if you're interested.

[RM260boy]

WOW!

[RM260boy]

do i follow? ish specific, zacar less specific adam generic?

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by RM260boy

do i follow? ish specific, zacar less specific adam generic?

ish - definitely man/husband.
zacar - definitely male (as opposed to "man" or "husband")
adam - generic human

[RM260boy]

if you care to address it siras or is that saris (trying to do from memory).... is a whole 'nother animal so to speak

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by RM260boy

if you care to address it siras or is that saris (trying to do from memory).... is a whole 'nother animal so to speak

Can you give me a chapter/verse reference?

shiras means root, but I don't know if that is what you mean.

[RM260boy]

have seen it translated as gaurd, chamberlain, eunuch and several other things it is very possible that i have misspelled it... but it seems to translate differently according to whom it is addressed... i have also seen it reffered to in the talmud writings when i was trying to get more meaniing out of it

[andrewlittle]

Sorry - completely different part of Genesis. I'm also kind of singles minded. This is a word, actually words, that give rise to parts of Genesis being redactions or later additions.

sariys, s'riys, sarisey, s'risey, sarisayu, sarisiym are all related words that are common to a later time - notably the period after the Babylonian exile. They are generally understood as official, representative, manager, etc. but in the sense of a trusted slave. Because of known or supposed cultural norms, a person called by this name may be assumed to be a eunuch.

The NRSV only translates 6 of the fourteen occurences of this word (in the entire OT) in the singular form as eunuch. The rest of the time they use one of the other words. The KJV uses eunuch only twice.

This is definitely one of those words where context, other textual references and preconceived notions affects translation. It is far from definitive.

[RM260boy]

i kind of figured it would be a difficult one to pinpoint ... so a translators mindset(boiling all the context culture and so forth) would have a large bearing on what comes out... sorry for the late response, sleep overcame me

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by RM260boy

i kind of figured it would be a difficult one to pinpoint ... so a translators mindset(boiling all the context culture and so forth) would have a large bearing on what comes out... sorry for the late response, sleep overcame me

You'll have to be careful to avoid falling into the trap of being numbed into unconsciousness. Some people who have read my posts are still comotose.

Actually, I'm envious - last night I would have loved it if sleep overcame me.

I think Brent's post opened up good territory. Phrases that include a form of the word, mishcav, and a reference to man, male, woman or female.

I'll work on that next, unless you want to take this another direction. If you do, PLEASE do - it gets scary living only in my own head.

[RM260boy]

no please keep it coming i am eating it up... and hungry too!

it was the hour and not the message , i realized that i should have edited it after i entered

[andrewlittle]

I'm looking at it in more depth than I have before.

[andrewlittle]

The prohibition against same-sex relations is centered on the phrasing in Lev 18:22 and 20:13, which is no news to anyone who has been beaten about the head and shoulders with these verses.

The critical translation issue, about which I have written several times and is included in the link a previous post, is with the phrase mish'c'bey ishah.

While literally saying "the beds of a woman/wife", it is traditionally interpreted as "as with a woman". Despite this phrase appearing only twice in scripture, in these particular verses, and in exactly the same form, the translaters say it is a euphemism for "lying as you would with a woman", based on similar occurences with mish'cab zacar in Numbers and Judges. The argument goes that, if you cannot find the exact phrase repeated in another context, you go to a similar phrase in other contexts to decide the meaning.

I will see if I can use their logic to disprove their assumptions.

There only five instances of mish'cab being used in direct connection with a gender noun (man, woman, male, female, etc.). In each case the connection is known to be direct because, as is the case with the Leviticus verses, the form of the noun mish'cab is construct - meaning it intended to show possession by use of a suffix (giving the meaning of "my", "your", "his", "their", etc) or to be connected to the next noun by the use of the word "of". In the latter case it shows possession or association of an object by the following object. An example of the latter can be found in Genesis 49:4, in which mish'c'bey abiyca is rightly translated as "bed of your father"

The five instances are:

Numbers 31:17 Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man by sleeping with him.
... v'cal-ishah yida't iysh l'mish'cab zacar.

Numbers 31:18 But all the young girls who have not known a man by sleeping with him, keep alive for yourselves.
... lo-yad'u mish'cab zacar

Numbers 31:35 ... and thirty-two thousand persons in all, women who had not known a man by sleeping with him.
... lo-yad'u mish'cab zacar

Judges 21:11 This is what you shall do; every male, and every woman that has lain with a male, you shall devote to destruction."
... cal-zacar v'cal-ishah yida't mish'cab zacar...

Judges 21:12 And they found among the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead four hundred young virgins who had never slept with a man and brought them to the camp at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.
... lo-yad'ah iysh l'mish'cab zacar

Now, forget the particularly heinous nature of these passages, if you can. Yet another example, even in scripture, of the human ability to justify oppression and mysogeny in the name of God, I guess.

Okay, to my point. In each case, the concept of a woman "lying with a man" is centered on mish'cab zacar, sometimes with a prefix which generally means "for", but is totally ignored in the translations.

My first problem is one of frequency of use. To be established as a valid euphemism, a pattern of use needs to be established. These five verses comprise only two occurances - Numbers deal with one story, and Judges with a second. That hardly represents a pattern of use to establish an idiom or common euphemism.

That aside, there is another major issue. The literal phrase "bed(s) of a male" (mish'cab zacar) establish the locus of the actions described. Sleeping with a man is described as being in the "bed of a male". In Leviticus, the phrasing mish'c'bey ishah should then mean "sleeping with a woman", not "as with a woman". In Genesis 49:4, the phrase mish'c'bey abiyca should be understood as "sleeping with your father", not "bed of your father".

The euphemism claimed to exist is used selectively - namely, only where it suits the purpose of claiming that same-sex intercouse is an abomination. If that pattern of idiom - that it says "as with a woman" is applied to other passages, it becomes apparent it it wrong.

Genesis 49:4 would read, "Unstable as water, you shall no longer excel because you went up and slept as with your father; then you defiled it-- you went up onto my couch!"

Makes no sense at all. The same would be true for the Numbers and Judges passages.

The important point of the phrasing mish'c'bey ... or mish'cab ... is that the bed is the locus of activity. In Gen 49:4, the son is not to be trusted. The reference to defiling his father’s bed comes from Gen 35:22, in which Rueben went and lay with Billah who was his father’s concubine (common-law wife). The act is adultery. The description is what happens to the bed. Rueben committed adultery with his father’s wife, but is described as defiling his bed. As the locus of marital relations, the bed is the focus of attention since it was defiled.

The stories in Numbers and Judges make sense only if the reference is understood that certain actions occurred in the "bed of a male". In Leviticus, then, the locus is the "bed of a woman/wife". Two men are prohibited from engaging in sexual relations on "a wife's bed", because that would constitute adultery (one of them would presumably be the wife's husband, or they are both guilty of traspassing(?)). And adultery is a common theme elsewhere in scripture, AND comes with the consequence of death.

Okay, does this make sense?

[BrentRichards]

See, I told you Andy would have the answer!

Andy, do you have a doctorate? Just curious.

[u-dog]

His head JUST exploded. Thanks SO MUCH Brent! He will be INSUFFERABLE from now on! Doctor Little! (the little doctor?)


But as long as the damage is done I might as well say that his amazing work on this site has inspired me to go back and audit beginning Greek this Fall. (I mostly want to find out if all the stuff he says is true or if he is just the best BS artist in the universe!

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by BrentRichards

See, I told you Andy would have the answer!

Andy, do you have a doctorate? Just curious.

No, I decided I was too old to pursue a PhD. I finished seminary at age 51. I'd be 56 or so by the time I would be done with a doctorate. Not to mention the money involved.

I had a remarkable opportunity, however. I got to study for a full year at Cambridge University in 2003/2004. I concentrated on Biblical languages and Bible Studies while in England, after taking a year each of Hebrew and Greek at my home seminary.

It cost me an extra year for earning my MDiv, but it was well worth it and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

[BrentRichards]

The extra time shows! I'm toying with the idea of doing a PhD in a couple years when my kids are done with school. Might be able to get that all done by 45, which still leaves a chunk of life (one hopes) to use it.

[andrewlittle]

Originally Posted by BrentRichards

The extra time shows! I'm toying with the idea of doing a PhD in a couple years when my kids are done with school. Might be able to get that all done by 45, which still leaves a chunk of life (one hopes) to use it.

Do it! I envy you the age difference and the opportunity. You could still spend 20-30 years teaching.

Wow, another great Presbyterian professor - one step closer to controlling all academia.

Oh, excuse me - my mind wandered.

[BrentRichards]

Originally Posted by andrewlittle

Do it! I envy you the age difference and the opportunity. You could still spend 20-30 years teaching.

Wow, another great Presbyterian professor - one step closer to controlling all academia.

Oh, excuse me - my mind wandered.

AND, I'm a Freemason ... we know all about conspiracy! (Puh-lease)