Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Read, James C" <K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk>]

Yizthak wrote:
You're simply wrong on the linguistic issue.  But even assuming you are right,
how do you know that Chronicles did not understand the subject of "wyst" to be
God's anger.  Couldn't we translate it (in light of your translation
above) "And an
adversary stood upon Israel and one [ie, God's anger] incited David to count 
Israel"?  If Chronicles "definitely" refers to the adversary in 1 Chr
21:1 then 2 Sam
24:1 just as definitely refers to God's anger being the inciter.
END QUOTE

You are absolutely right here. There is no way of knowing conclusively the 
answer 
to these questions if we are to consider only the linguistics of the phrases.
As you have rightly observed,the language in the passage in Chronicles also 
allows
for another interpretation of events and so we must look at a larger context 
in
order to correctly understand the two texts.

I do not want to get invovled in a futile debate about the authorship of Job 
but even
critics agree that it was composed long before Kings and Chronicles and so 
for the 
purposed of our discussion the book of Job provides a good context in 
understanding 
what could seem to be a contradiction.
The book of Job clearly identifies trials and temptation as originating with 
a fallen 
angel named Satan (adversary).

Furthermore, your current understanding of 2Sam 24 does not make sense if we 
are to 
understand it as a chain of events.

1) Yah gets angry
2) He gets David to commit a sin

The following questions arise:
1) Why did Yah get angry?
2) Surely if we are to understand that he got angry before the sin then there 
must have been another
reason for his anger. What was that reason?
3) If so, did Yah get David to sin just because he was already angry about 
something else?
4) Does this line of thinking have any logic what-so-ever?

This email has been scanned for all viruses by the MessageLabs Email
Security System.