Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Peter Kirk" <Peter_Kirk AT sil.org>]

I won't comment on the Ugaritic evidence. But the sense "breathe" makes good
sense here, and in all six of the seven occurrences (excluding for now 29:8)
in Proverbs of this word (6:19, 12:17, 14:5,25, 19:5,9, same form except
sometimes without waw, similar context each time, indeed except in 12:17 the
object is always K.:ZFBIYM "lies"). Here are some reasons to support the
sense "breathe":

1. It makes good sense as an idiom, especially if the idiom "breathe lies"
means "habitually tell lies".

2. In meany cases there is a parallel with ("D "witness". But in 6:19 the
YFPIYXA is equated with the ("D, so if YFPIYXA means "witness" the line is a
tautology. (Actually we found this line hard enough to translate and close
to tautologous even taking YFPIYXA as "speak", as we had only one word for
"lie" available.)

3. In Psalm 10:5 and perhaps Proverbs 29:8 the word is used in a sense of
speaking habitually in a negative way (as elsewhere in Proverbs, except
12:17), here mockery, but the sense "witness" would not fit.

As for the morphology, in Hebrew the root YPX is found as a variant of PWX
in Jeremiah 4:31.

Is it actually well proved that in Ugaritic YPX means "witness"? Or is it
one of those cases where a gloss was attached to the word because "witness"
fitted the context? Does the Ugaritic word necessarily mean more than
"speak"? This is important, as we must make sure that we don't interpret the
uncertain (Hebrew) from the obscure and conjectural (Ugaritic, perhaps).

Peter Kirk


-----Original Message-----
From: Brian Tucker [mailto:editor AT journalofbiblicalstudies.org]
Sent: 17 January 2001 19:11
To: Biblical Hebrew
Subject: Breathe or Witness in Proverbs 14:5


Should one understand W:YFP"YXA Breathe or Witness

Prov 14:5 BDB lists this as a verb from the root [peh waw het (PWX)]
(BDB,806). Bibleworks shows it as hiphil imperfect 3rd person masculine
singular from (peh waw het [PWX]) meaning to breathe or blow or cause to
do such.

Loewenstamm and Pardee showed that the Ugaritic [yph] 'witness' (4.258,5)
offers a better range of meaning for the biblical term.

1. If this is true could someone explain the morphology of the word if it
is from a different root.

2. Is BDB wrong here? Should we understand it as a 'witness' the NAU has
witness but has 'breathes out' in the margin.

3. How would you parse W:YFP"YXA if it is not a hiphil imperfect 3rd
person masculine singular from PWX?

4. Does the parallel of PWX and ("D in Proverbs 19:9 offer enough support
for this new understanding of the term?

Thanks
Brian Tucker
editor AT journalofbiblicalstudies.org
http://journalofbiblicalstudies.org