Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Reinier de Blois" <r.de.blois AT solcon.nl>]

Dear Vadim,

You wrote:

> Verse 12, lapsheim ifgia, usually translated as interceded for
criminals Interceded is always
> encountered in Tanakh with preposition be, meaning before someone, and
with a clear definition
> of the goal of intercession, such as not to burn the scroll.
Preposition le, when employed 
> with ifgia, means attached to. Therefore, he was attached to
criminals, or, regarded as 
> one of the criminals.

I just finished working on PG( for our dictionary project and I found at
least one case that contradicts your last statement. Take Genesis 23:8,
where Abraham asks some people to make a request to Ephron "for him",
which is LIY in Hebrew. So if that phrase is correct I don't see any
reason why LP$(YM YPGIY( couldn't mean "pray for criminals".

By the way, PG( is not exclusively found with the preposition BE, but
also with 'ET (Exodus 5:20)or without direct object marker (Exodus
23:4), though I admit that BE is by far the most common. In Isaiah
53:12, however, BE is not needed because the phrase stating to whom the
intercession was directed is not in the text. 

Best wishes,

Reinier de Blois