Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Eric Weiss <papaweiss1 AT yahoo.com>]

Peter Kirk wrote:

> When was this book published? I suppose before the DSS 
> were discovered this could not be disproved. But the 
> discovery of the DSS has proved that the MT, at least 
> its consonants, dates from before the Christian era, 
> with only rather minor changes since then e.g. in the 
> Isaiah scroll. The suggestion that MT is "medieval" is 
> thereby completely disproved. 

FYI (I wanted some unbiased responses first, before indicating the book I 
read this in), the book(s) I'm quoting from are:

ISBN 0944359175 The Holy Gospels (p. 582)
ISBN 0944359183 Acts, Epistles and Revelation (not sure what page, but the 
comments about the Masoretic Text are the same, as I recall)
December 2000
Publishe by Holy Apostles Convent

It's published by an Orthodox monastic group and contains many endnotes re: 
Early Church Fathers' comments on various passages. I haven't really read the 
NT mss. comments, but I felt the comments about the Masoretic Text were 
quite odd, hence my post/query here. Since the LXX is the canonical Old 
Testament for the Orthodox Church, I suspected a Greek/Septuagintal bias, but 
these comments went beyond any criticisms of the Hebrew text I had ever read, 
asserting things that just didn't match what I'd learned about the 
transmission of 
the Hebrew text.

Thanks for your responses and any others you might post.


Eric S. Weiss


                
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Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 11:02:00 -0500
From: Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com>
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Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] 2300 evening - mornings
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Dear Joel,

>>First of all I want to say that I personally have no specific
>>religious interpretation of these very controversial verses so I don't
>>really have any agenda I am pushing here.
>>It seems to me the most plain rendering of what is intended is:
>>
>>Daniel asks until when is the vision of:
>>1. [the lack of] daily sacrifice
>>2. Giving of an abomination of desolation [in place of the sacrifice]
>>3. [The defilement of] the sanctuary
>>4. The trodding down army or host
>>
>>He is answered 2300 "evening mornings" and then the sanctuary is cleansed.
>>
>>The grammar is problematic with the KJV rendering which most
>>translations seem to follow. Why the vav before QDW$ in 13 (translated
>>as 'both' in KJV)? No direct object marker either. This is why I put
>>TT with the preceding words. I looked for any concurring translations
>>on this and found NAB had done the same. Seems to make the most sense
>>to me.
>>    
>>

HH: Here is the NAB:

Dan 8:13: I heard a holy one speaking, and another said to whichever one 
it was that spoke, "How long shall the events of this vision last 
concerning the daily sacrifice, the desolating sin which is placed 
there, the sanctuary, and the trampled host?"

>>I kind of like what NAB did on verse 12 as well. It strengthens the
>>association of the NTN verb with P$).
>>    
>>

HH: You mean P$(. Here is NAB, verses 11-12:

11
It boasted even against the prince of the host, from whom it removed the 
daily sacrifice, and whose sanctuary it cast down,
12
as well as the host, while sin replaced the daily sacrifice. It cast 
truth to the ground, and was succeeding in its undertaking.


>>I am certainly willing to hear other ideas. Especially if someone can
>>point to similar constructions of a compound direct object sans marker
>>with both preceded with a vav in the sense of both ... and ...
>>    
>>

HH: First, it seems dubious that the active infinitive TT by itself can 
imply "which is placed there." One is adding a relative in English, a 
passive idea, and an adverbial modifier ("there"). How can this be 
justified? On the other hand, the KJV rendering is natural. There does 
not always have to be a marker for the accusative; look at Waltke and 
O'Connor, Biblical Hebrew Syntax 10.2.1c, examples 10, 20-22, and many, 
many places. If you don't have that book, see Ps 16:4; Gen 49:6; Job 
5:2; Isa 57:4; Gen 1:11; Gen 9:14. Gesenius' Hebrew grammar says of the 
direct object marker, "The use of this nota accusativi is, however, 
somewhat rare in poetry, and even in prose it is not invariably 
necessary but is restricted to those cases in which the accusative of 
the object is more closely determined by being a proper name, or having 
the article, or by a following determinative genitive (hence also by the 
suffixes), or in some other way." I would add that there are exceptions 
even in these noted cases. Walke and O'Connor cite cases lacking the 
marker where there are pronominal suffixes on the direct object 
accusative (Ps 16:4; Isa 1:3;).

HH: The nouns in question in Dan 8:13 do not have a definite article, a 
suffix, or a following determinative genitive, and they are not proper 
names, so the absence of the direct object marker would not be surprising.

HH: Some translations may not deal well with the Hebrew text. I don't 
like the HCSB here, which acts as though there were a vav before TT:

HCSB Dan 8:13 Then I heard a holy one speaking, and another holy one 
said to the speaker, "How long will [the events of] this vision last 
—the daily sacrifice, the rebellion that makes desolate, and the giving 
over of the sanctuary and of the host to be trampled?"

HH: I think a literal rendering should have something like this 
modification of the NRSV (though it is unwieldy):

Dan. 8:13 Then I heard a holy one speaking, and another holy one said to 
the one that spoke, “For how long is this vision concerning the regular 
burnt offering and the transgression that makes desolate so as to give 
over the sanctuary and host to be trampled?”

HH: You can object that the earlier verses do not mention the sanctuary 
being trampled, but they certainly allow for it in saying that the 
sanctuary is cast down (v. 11), with truth being cast down to the ground 
(v. 12). Also, the verb "give" (TT) in verse 13 matches the verb "give" 
in verse 12 that speaks of the army and the sacrifice being given to 
this enemy. The sacrifice being given would imply the place of the 
sacrifice as well, the sanctuary.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard