Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

K Randolph wrote:

> Why all this effort to support the LXX reading?

HH: It is also the Vulgate reading, which Jerome 
did from the Hebrew. And the Syriac reading 
apparently agrees with the LXX. And there are 
Hebrew variants that do, one as old as the Dead 
Sea Scrolls.


> After all, was not LXX written because people were forgetting Biblical
> Hebrew? This was not only true among the Greek speaking diaspora, but
> also among the Aramaic speaking  Jews of Babylon and Judea / Galilee.
> Thus it is understandable that when the translators reached Psalm
> 22:17, seeing a word that they did not recognize, tried to say that it
> was KRH with an added aleph. But there is a root K)R that is extant
> not only here, but also in Akkadian and in Amos 8:8, so why not go
> with it?


HH: In Amos 8:8 it is apparently a defective form 
for KY)R, as its parallel with KY)WR MRYM in the 
next colon demonstrates, as well as the repetition 
of the same phrase in 9:5.


> By the way, KRH in Biblical Hebrew did not mean "to dig", rather "to
> provide (for)" which was often used, particularly in Genesis, in the
> context of providing wells for watering sheep when out in the
> pastures. True, digging was the means by which wells were provided,
> but the word is "provide".

HH: Check your lexicons.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard