Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

Dear Michael:

I am not a trained tanslator, just a person who tries to understand to the 
best of my ability what is meant in the original language. As such, I try to 
delineate where are the borders of a term’s meaning, then let you translators 
sweat how to render the meaning into the target language.

Even so, it is much easier to understand a word in a learned language if 
there is a close equivelant in one’s mother tongue. NP$ is a term I have 
sweat over trying to understanding it in that there is no equivelant in 
English, my mother tongue, nor in any other language I learned prior to 
Hebrew.

As far as I can recognize, NP$ refers to “life force” and/or “(formerly) 
living creature” or by extension “life, being”. Did the ancient Hebrews of a 
spiritual portion of a person that lived on even after a person died? If so, 
would the term they’d have used for that concept be RWX ruach and not NP$?

Karl W. Randolph.

----- Original Message -----
From: Deborah Millier <deborahmillier AT yahoo.com>

> J. Sprinkle wrote:
> 
> > I agree that the sense "life" 
> > comes close the sense of 
> > "soul," but it reads too much 
> > into the text to identify the 
> > two terms.
> 
> I'm a trained Bible translator (though not a
> practicing one).  I'm "programmed" to look for the
> best semantic equivelant in a target language (in this
> case English)--even if some nuance(s) might have to be
> sacrificed.  Life fit the context of the Rachel story
> fairly well (I'm open to improvements), as it does the
> story of Elisha and the lad.
> 
> > All this reflects its broad 
> > usage.  And any particular 
> > usage can be debated as to 
> > which nuance is intended.
> 
> ...which is why I agree with Jim West.  We should
> stick with specific texts and "debate" them.  I
> brought up two which I think appraoch the idea of an
> immaterial NEPHESH which is in some sense distinct
> from the body.  How would you (or anybody) render into
> English the particular passages I mentioned?
> 
> -- Michael Millier
-- 
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