Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear list,

> In a message dated 12/21/2004 7:15:54 PM Central Standard Time,
> mshulman AT ix.netcom.com writes:
>
>
> >  If one interprets when translating one can make a verse mean anything. The
> >  word 'conceive' is not there.  The problem of the language implying the
> >  female having 'seed' led to a number of interesting comments by the Rabbis
>
> I wont to point out another prophesy, in addition to the promise of a virgin
> birth, there is also a promise to Satan that he shall have a "seed."  Now
> that's scarry, Satan with an offspring.

HH: The Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew does give "conceive" as a 
meaning for the Hiphil of ZR(. [By the way, they note without comment 
that the Samaritan text of Lev 12:2 uses the Niphil instead of the 
Hiphil for ZR(.] Although the Hiphil of ZR( might suggest "produce 
seed," since that is a legitimate meaning for the word in regard to 
plants, it may also be a decorous term for what happens in a woman. 
Surely you would not want to say that she "sprouted." What makes me 
sympathetic with Doug's idea is that a man obviously deposits seed. 
Since ancients could see that, whether they understood anything about 
an egg would not be so important. They would have seen that the man 
planted seed in the woman. So the Hiphil of ZR( may have been a term 
to indicate that this seed germinated.

                                        Yours,
                                        Harold Holmyard