Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

> Hello,
>
> I think the contex  is still against a literial reading of *flying* 
> whether a pterosaur or a winged snake or a cockatrice.   In Isaiah 
> 14:26 the sequence of images and metaphors are there is a ordinary 
> snake (nakhach) which is a root (sheresh).  From this root grows a 
> stem or trunk, another ordinary snake (tsefa').  The fruit of this 
> root and stem is the *saraf m'ofef*.
>
> I read the sequence as ordinary snake (nakhach) gives rise to 
> ordinary snake (tsefa') gives rise to ordinary snake (saraf m'ofef). 
> I do not see any pattern or logic that would lead to a pattern of 
> *snake - snake - flying snake*.   King Ahaz had just died and the 
> Philistines were rejoicing as Ahaz had been scourge to them.  The 
> image is that from the root of Ahaz (someone dangerous to the 
> philistines as a snake might be) would arise some just as dangerous, 
> his son (an other snake, even more dangerous) so don't rejoice.   I 
> would venture that the sequence is one of increasing degree of 
> deadlyness of the venom of the three snakes.  Saraf has as its root 
> the sensation of burning, as a snakes venom has.  So if the reader / 
> listener associate *saraf m'ofef* as the most venomous of the three 
> snakes, the sequence makes sense.  The aspect of flying does add any 
> extra danger.


HH: It might add extra danger if it described how the snake attacks. 
I think you talked about the cobra in these terms.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard