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  • From: Søren Holst <sh AT teol.ku.dk>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: SV: [b-hebrew] Selah??
  • Date: Sun, 17 Aug 2003 11:23:07 +0200

According to John Goldingay (I think it was), for all we know it could be
the swearword David used when he broke a string.

just my two cents
happy sunday & shavua tov

Soren

> -----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
> Fra: ben.crick AT argonet.co.uk [SMTP:ben.crick AT argonet.co.uk]
> Sendt: 17. august 2003 00:47
> Til: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> Emne: Re: [b-hebrew] Selah??
>
> On Fri 15 Aug 2003 (23:00:51), peterg45 AT excite.com wrote:
> > Selah is a word which God slipped into the Old Testament Scriptures to
> > remind Hebrew scholars that they don't know everything.
>
> Yes, like He stuck the fossils into the rocks to confuse the
> anti-Creationists. 8-^)
>
> Baethgen and others have suggested that SeLaH is a Hebrew transcription
> of
> the Greek YALLE (where Y=Psi), "play". After all, the Greek word AFIKOMEN
> comes in the Haggadah of the Passover, so if the Psalter is the hymn book
> of
> the Second Temple, that's not as anachronistic as one might think. Many
> of the
> Bible's musical terms are Greek derived (compare Daniel 3:5, etc).
>
> Of the 74 occurrences of Selah, all but 4 are in pause with Silluq and
> Soph
> Pasuq: i.e. they are an extra "pause" at the end of a verse. To say that
> this
> is a cue to the musicians to strike up an interlude or a postlude is
> quite
> plausible. This is reinforced by Psalm 9:17 (16 in EVV) where we have
> HiGGaYoWN SeLaH, "play a stringed instrument(?)".
>
> The problem comes with the four instances where SeLaH occurs in the
> middle of
> a verse: i.e. Psalm 55:20 (19 in EVV) and 57:4 (5 in EVV); and in
> Habakkuk
> 3:3 and 3:9.
>
> In Ps 57:4 SeLaH is in pause with Athnach; but even so, is an interlude
> needed in the middle of a sentence, stopping at a comma or a colon?
> Likewise
> in Habakkuk 3:3, 9 SeLaH is in pause with Athnach in the middle of a
> verse. I
> suppose this is the strict meaning of "Inter-lude": something "played" in
> the
> "middle" of something? Then SeLaH at the end of a verse would be a
> Postlude.
>
> The SeLaH in Psalm 55:20 (19) seems so out of place that Kittel offers an
> emendation "prps KuLLoH". My lexical resources don't run to this; the
> nearest
> word I can find is KaLLaH, daughter-in-law or spouse, which makes no
> sense in
> context. This verse is a difficult one to construe anyway...
>
> Shalom
>
> Ben
> --
> Revd Ben Crick BA CF, and Mrs Joanna (Goodwin) Crick
> <ben.crick AT argonet.co.uk>
> 232 Canterbury Road, Birchington, Kent, CT7 9TD (UK)
> http://www.cnetwork.co.uk/crick.htm
>
>
>
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