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  • From: "B. M. Rocine" <brocine AT twcny.rr.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] labo' lepaney and Gen 6:13
  • Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2007 07:25:23 -0400

Hi Yonah,

Yonah Mishael wrote:
Bryan,

I think that in this particular situation, it is an idiom for the idea
of the arrival of the appropriate time for something. In other words,
HaShem is saying that the proper time for the destruction of all
living things had arrived.

I think you are stating here the common understanding of the idiom, which I understand, but I think there is another possible understanding.
It doesn't have anything to do with "the
end" having an audience with HaShem.

I didn't mean to say that the end had an audience. If the idiom _labo' lipney_ is typically used of someone coming into the audience of a great authority, a certain kind of baggage comes along with the Hebrew writier's use of the idiom as as shared with the Hebrew readers. The baggage is that of "a scene of supplication." Who would I suggest was the supplicant? I don't know. All that was good, I guess--Noah, the elephants, the horses, the bumblebees, the trees, the hills, the sky. The world had become a terrible place and all that was good felt threatened. The earth itself groaned.
It just means that the
consequence that people's behaviors had merited was destruction, and
the proper time for it arrived — and HaShem was, therefore, going into
action against the world in punishment of their violence and iniquity.

What do you think?

I think you are right, but I think there are a few glimpses of another side to the decision. The decision to flood the world was one of anger and grief at unrighteousness to be sure. But it was also one of love. That is, HaShem loved Noah and the animal kingdom, so He saved them. So maybe even the idiom in question suggests HaShem saved them from a violent world before the violent world could destroy all life. It was indeed the proper time for action.

Shalom,
Bryan
Yonah

On 4/20/07, B. M. Rocine <brocine AT twcny.rr.com> wrote:
Hi Karl,

How about if we exercise just a bit of imagination in reading the poetry
and see the human supplicants that come as "required attachments" to the
groan and the petition?

I believe the technical name for the figures in verses you quote is
metonymy. The two vv. in Psa are very much about gaining an audience
with YHWH.

Shalom,
Bryan
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B.M. Rocine
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