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  • From: "Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Genesis 3:15 and order of ideas
  • Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 15:07:24 -0600

Dear list,

Here is what Jacob Milgrom says about Lev 12:2:

at childbirth, tazria', literally, "produces seed." The Sam., followed by the Versions, reads tizzara' (niphal) "becomes pregnant, conceives." But the emendation is unnecessary. zera', normally "seed," can also stand for the fully grown fruit (Gen 1:11-12; Wessely 1846), which, in the case of the human seed, means "offspring" (e.g., Gen 3:15). The hiphil tazria' would then denote "produces offspring." Furthermore, the womb of the woman is associated with the womb of the earth. Human offspring, like the earth's vegetation, can reproduce (cf. Ibn Ezra). Alternatively, the hiphil may be considered to be a stative, but in the elative mode, otherwise known as an internal hiphil (GKC #53d), connoting the completion of an action, as in hiqrib tabo' "he was about to enter" (Gen 12:11), in other words, he had reached the border: ya'arikun yameka "that your days may be very long" (Exod 20:12), in other words, permanent, forever. The rendering here would, then, be "when a woman comes to term (i.e., at the completion of her pregnancy) and delivers a male" (D. N. Freedman). In either case, tazria' is apt. Yet the probability rests with the literal translation, "produces seed." The rabbis held that conception occurred when the woman's blood united with the male sperm. Moreover, many of the ancients (e.g., Galen; cf. Pruess 1978: 387-88) assumed that the menstrual blood contains the seed (i.e. ovum) that unites with the male seed (i.e. semen) to produce the human being. And the Aramaic translation ta'ade (Trs. Onq, Ps.-J.) is semantically related to words for youth, pubescence, and menstrual clothing (cf. Isa 64:5; Jer 2:32; esp. Ezek 16:7), thus creating a semantic field around the basic meaning "[genital] seed."

HH: Our discussion involved agreement that the term could or should be translated "conceive." That is what Milgrom means by his literal translation "produce seed." He includes the male sperm in the process. Milgrom's discussion does vindicate Moshe's idea that "produce seed" is the idea, but also Doug's idea that the male sperm is assumed.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard





On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 13:27:52 -0500 Jim West <jwest AT highland.net> writes:
At 01:18 PM 12/22/2004, you wrote:

>Paul, being a Roman citizen from Asia Minor, probably spoke Greek
as his
>mother toungue, and probably thought in Greek as well. Chances are
that he
>"imported" Greek expressions into his Hebrew or Aramaic, not the
other way
>around. Certainly, when writing Greek, he thought like a Greek.
>
>Yigal

Paul in 99% likelihood was not the author of Hebrews. Whoever did
write
it, wrote excellent greek, excelled in the New Testament only by the
author
of 1 Peter. Nonetheless you are correct in observing that when
writing
Greek one thinks in Greek and including a loan word or two from
Hebrew or
Aramaic doesn't change that fact any more than someone occasionally

inserting "vis-a-vis" makes them a fluent thinker in French.

Jim


++++++++++++++++++++
Jim West, ThD
Adjunct Professor of Biblical Studies
Quartz Hill School of Theology
____________

Jim,

I beg your pardon, but the likelihood that Paul was the author of Hebrews
is approx. 0.001%

george
gfsomsel
___________
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