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  • From: "Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Translating Ezekiel 16:26
  • Date: Sun, 31 Jul 2005 07:21:20 -0500

Kelton, "paramours" or "lovers" is what the first word implies according to translations or dictionaries I've seen. It is "concubine" in the feminine, but that's what concubines were, too: lovers or paramours.

I think it is refering to their genitials based on Ezekiel 23:20. The only trouble is translating PILAG:$"YHEM in Ez 23:20. I think that it is refering to the Egyptians 'genitals' as opposed to their concubines, because that does not make sense to me. But the pronoun is masculine, so it is something belonging to the men. So I think the relative clause here is futher describing PILAG:$"YHEM . So Israel lusted after their genitials, which was the flesh (genitial size) of a donkey.

So, tracing back to Ez 16:26, even though the context is fornication, I think mentioning the size here points to the inticement of the Egyptians. Israel was so blinded by lust, that she went after what she really desired, namely what attracted her eyes.

And maybe the reason why the NIV and other translators, translate this as lust is because of censorship. I mean I'd have a hard time publishing this one.

--
Kelton Graham
KGRAHAM0938 AT comcast.net

-------------- Original message --------------

I am working through Ezekiel and I am not sure how to take the phrase
גדלי בשר [GDLY B&R] "those being great of flesh" in Ezekiel
16:26. It's clear enough from the context that the speaker is
referring to male genitalia, and the use of בשר [B&R] in Ezekiel
23:20 confirms this. However, I am not sure whether to understand
גדלי בשר [GDLY B&R] as a reference simply to large genitalia
per se, or to _enlarged_ genitalia, that is, erections. NIV, NRSV,
and JPS all take it in the latter sense, and translate it as
"lustful." The LXX has a fairly literalistic translation,
µεÎ"αλοσάρκος [MEGALOSARKOS], "big-fleshed." Neither the
Hebrew word-pair nor the Greek word appear elsewhere in the Tanakh or
LXX, so I don't have any comparative data there to work with. Does
anyone know of any good evidence, e.g. uses of the Hebrew phrase or
Greek word in extra-biblical sources, or similar phrases in cognate
languages, that would help me solidify this translation, or is it an
irreducible ambiguity? Anybody know why NIV, NRSV, JPS read this as
they do?
--
R. Christopher Heard
Assistant Professor of Religion
Pepperdine University
Malibu, California 90263-4352
http://faculty.pepperdine.edu/cheard
http://www.iTanakh.org
http://www.semioticsandexegesis.info
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