Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Loren Crow" <lorencrow AT earthling.net>]

No, in differentiating "thy" from "your" I was making a singular-plural
distinction, not a formal-informal distinction.  This is what the terms
meant in 1611, too.

You're right, Deuteronomy certainly does that.  It's part of Deut's
characteristic (even idiosyncratic) rhetorical style.  I haven't studied the
matter, but my hunch is that the difference between them depends on whether
the law/concept being spoken about is primarily a communal law (which would
use singular) or a law for individual life (which would use plural).


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The unexamined life is not worth living.
                           - Socrates

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew C Smith [mailto:a.c.smith AT juno.com]
Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 1998 7:58 PM
To: Biblical Hebrew
Subject: [formal?] "your" pl. and sing.


On Tue, 10 Nov 1998 15:26:13 -0600 lorencrow AT earthling.net (Loren Crow)
writes:

>Seriously, though, this phrase plays an important part in the
>characterization of both speaker and person/s spoken to in biblical
>narratives.  When Saul addresses Samuel and speaks of yhwh as yhwh thy
>(singular) God, this tells us something important about Saul and
>Samuel, and their relationship.

Loren -

Are you saying that Hebrew has a formal and informal second person, like
French or German?

Yet Moses switches back and forth between "the Lord your God" and "the
Lord y'all's God" in the middle of one speech to the same crowd of
people.

A.C. Smith

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