[b-hebrew] barak (bless? curse?) in the Book of Job

K Randolph kwrandolph at gmail.com
Thu Jan 29 12:18:53 EST 2009


John:

On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 8:23 AM, John Estell <oldearther at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Karl,
>
> *"But outside of slang where thereis a deliberate attempt at obfuscation,
> no where is that semantic range so
> broad that a word can have one meaning and its opposite."
> *
>
> **
>
> What about *olam* (and in Greek, *aion/aionios*) ?  Can't that refer to
> both time and eternity?  Aren't these opposite meanings?
>
> The question of (WLM was debated in greater detail before. It comes from
the same root as "to cause to be unknown" i.e. to hide, (LMWT alamut the
unknown, T(LMH unknown thing, and in reference to time, it is to a time of
unknown span. By extension, eternity also extends off into the unknown. So
the two are related, not opposite.

This has often led to misunderstanding of texts, as when people see (WLM
they assume that eternity is meant, when only a time span of unknown length
but which has a definite end is meant in the text.

The Greek word refers to an eon, a very long span of time, and by extension,
eternity. But that's Greek.

>
> John Estell
>

Karl W. Randolph.


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