Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Bill Ross" <BillRoss AT norisksoftware.com>]

<Bill>
I offered as a possible translation for Psalm 45:6 either "Thy throne?
God" or "Thy throne [is] God" and received the following reply.

Is this Hebrew advice accurate?

Begin Quote:
Psa 45:6 is a classic use of the Vocative, as defined in Bruce Waltke's
Hebrew Grammar, Page 77, Sec. 4:7: "Vocatives stand in apposition to the
2nd person pronoun, expressed or unexpressed, and may occur with either
verbless or verbal clauses". 
"your throne" in the Heb is a noun, m.s. w/2nd pers m.s. suffix pronoun.

"Elohim" is in apposition to that noun with the 2nd person pl. pronoun,
and in our language is translated, "Your throne, O God [is]
everlasting". 
If you will check with all your English translations, that you can
trust, they all transl it the same way. And they all agree because it is
a "no-brainer" to transl. 

You can also see the Gk transl in Heb 1:8 agrees, which is word for word
from the LXX. So what is the beef? 
Consider the attempt that you sent: "Your throne is God". 1. what does
the whole sentence sound like, or is that the full sentence? 2.
theologically, what does this say? How does this apply to the Messiah? I
don't believe anyone could make a logical explanation. 
The second suggested transl also needs to be examined. "Your Throne? God
forever and forever". Two incomplete sentences! That violates common
grammatical rules.
End Quote.

Thanks,

Bill Ross
BillRoss AT norisksoftware.com