[b-hebrew] Ecclesiastes 3:11
Martin Shields
enkidu at bigpond.net.au
Fri Nov 16 16:52:59 EST 2007
Yitzhak,
> Is it possible that the author of Qohelet is here trying to write in
> Hebrew
> a phrase using a specific word structure that is more natural in an
> Indo-
> European language, such as Greek (the phrase being something of the
> sort of "without which a man will not find")?
I think this is what the text means (see my other posts), but I don't
think understanding it this way is necessarily dependent upon Indo-
European influence. I think it is probably the simplest understanding
of the Hebrew anyway. OTOH, there's a long tradition of seeing Greek
influence in Qohelet, and if that's to be seen in any way in this
verse I suspect it is more likely related to העלם (αιων in the
LXX which is a term loaded with rather more baggage than עולם in
biblical Hebrew).
I'm not convinced that there is Greek influence in Qohelet, but I
wouldn't rule it out as a possibility.
Regards,
Martin Shields,
Sydney, Australia.
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