Biblical Hebrew Forum

["K Randolph" <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Chris:

I see the second as a parallel to LRQ YG(TY. I have complete (used up)
my strength is a parallel to the tiring from hard work that is YG(,
and he has done it for lifelessness and futility just as in the first
section it was for emptiness.

I don't have the KJV nor NIV before me, but from the short snippets
you quote, it appears that they don't follow the Hebrew.

Karl W. Randolph.

On 11/17/06, Chris and Nel <wattswestmaas AT eircom.net> wrote:
> Dear Members,
>
> ISAIAH 49:4
>
> ".....I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in
> vain..... (KJV)
>
> '.....I have laboured to no purpose I have spent my strength in vain and for
> nothing....(NIV)
>
> Leaving the variety of shades of meaning of the various words aside, My
> objection is specifically with the positioning of the word "strength" in the
> English translations.
>
> The hebrew words: 'LeToHu VeHeVel' --  there is a merekhah under the TaV and
> a tifha under the HeH of the following word, As I understand it the merekhah
> binds the following word which carries a tifha and this tifha is
> disjunctive.  Furthermore the next word: 'CoCHi' carries a munah to bind it
> with the next word.
>
> Yet moreso is this: As I read the hebrew I am dividing the sentence quite
> poetically and naturally in this manner:
>
> ----VeANi AMaRTi ---LeRiK YaGaRTi----LeToHu VHeVeL----CoCHi CiLeTi----
>
> To Summarise, WHY then can we not translate: 'LeToHu VeHeVel' as a seperate
> clause such as being an interpolation by the author in a moment of breathing
> out, sighing out some extra clarifying personal feelings, like a pause after
> the preceding verb, just as if one was to say in English:
>
> "...I have laboured exhaustively...(and for what)?... (He sighs)but for
> emptiness and futile things, (aah) my strength is all but ended"
>
> and then translate up to the atnah as: My strength is at an end, or my
> strength is consumed" or whatever?  I do not see that "MY STRENGTH:  has
> anything to do with the preceding two hebrew words.  The author is
> summarising everything just gone before by saying that my strength is at an
> end.  I see no justification for binding 'My Strngth' to 'LeToHu VHeVeL'
>
> Your comments would really be appreciated, I am sharing with you my personal
> difficulty at trying to understand why the orthodox translations have done
> what appears to me to be slightly innaccurate.
>
> Best Regards
> Chris Watts
> Ireland.