Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

Dear Herman:

You weren't on this list when we earlier discussed 
in greater detail concepts of lexicography. One of 
the biggest differences between me and most modern 
lexicographers is that I tend to look for meaning 
first in the action referred to, they to the form 
in which it is found (semantic domain).

Do words mean one thing and its opposite? Even in 
modern English, that is not found except in gutter 
slang. Should we expect to find gutter slang in 
Tanakh? I don't expect it, do you?

(I will not be surprised if someone out there can 
come up with an example of where an opposite usage 
started as gutter slang generations ago that has 
become gentrified and codified in modern English, 
but I can't think of any right now.)

Of course words have an range of meaning whose 
borders are fuzzy, for some words the range is 
larger and for others it is smaller. BRK in the 
verbal usage refers first to the action of kneeling 
down, which includes an action which one receives 
or gives when kneeling, namely a blessing.

In 1 Kings 21, as well as Job 1:5, I see the action 
of kneeling down being understood as figurative to 
a person putting himself above another. In the case 
of Job's sons that was listed only as a possibility 
and then unintentionally. In the case of Naboth, he 
was accused of intentionally doing so. "He kneeled 
God and the king down" was a capital crime against 
both God and the king for it was putting himself 
above both. This was not a curse, but a different 
crime. The accusation was false, but he died 
because of it.

Thanks for this discussion. It has helped me think 
through to try to understand this passage.

Karl W. Randolph.

Ps. Is a cemetery ever called a "beit chayyim" in 
Tanakh, and if so, where? I draw a blank.

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Herman Meester" <crazymulgogi AT gmail.com>
> 
> Dear Karl,
> 
> Although it is quite understandable to try to fit all passages where
> BRK occurs into one meaning of BRK, "bless", we can hardly find a
> single word in Hebrew for which every time one meaning, or rather, one
> translation, is applicable. Of course, BRK means basically "bless",
> even in the cases discussed above. However, the word is used as a
> euphemism for "curse" in order to avoid the latter word and the word
> "God" to occur together. This does not mean that BRK can *mean*
> "curse", because it can't; it only refers to it here in this
> exceptional case. Cf. the word Bet-Chayyim often used for "cemetery",
> which of course *means* "House of the Living", it just refers to
> something else.
> 
> regards
> Herman

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