Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Paul Zellmer" <pzellmer AT sc.rr.com>]

To Ian,

I trust you can see the difference between what Liz reports of Rashi's
position here and what you have been suggesting as possibilities.  Rashi
does state, as have you, that the first action of creation reported here is
in v. 3.  Most, if not all, would agree with that.  This makes vv 1-2
introduction, setting the stage as it were.  But treating the SVO clauses in
v. 2 as pluperfects is a significant degree different from making them
dependent clauses, all tied together in one lump with BARA 'LHYM in verse 1,
and subordinant to the action of verse 3.

HTH,

Paul Zellmer

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lisbeth S. Fried [mailto:lizfried AT umich.edu]
> Sent: Sunday, March 17, 2002 12:04 AM
> To: Biblical Hebrew
> Subject: RE: bereshit and mereshit.
>
>
> I haven't been following this thread at all,
> so I hope I'm not repeating stuff. But wasn't all this
> discussed already years ago on this list? Anyway,
> according to Rashi, it is in the construct state,
> which is good enough for me, frankly.
> He offers as proof the fact that every other occurence is also
> in the construct state.
> According to Rashi, God's first creative act is the creation of light.
> He states the bible does not talk about what went on before, but
> at the beginning of God's creating the sky and land, the land was
> at that time an uninhabitabed wilderness, and darkness and
> waters covered the earth, and a wind from God went up and
> down over the water. Rashi points out that when clauses begin
> with a noun, and are SVO, then they should be translated as in
> the pluperfect. They express an action that occurs at that time or
> before that time.
> But maybe all this has been said, if so I apologize.
> Liz