Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

Dear Jason,

I'll leave the grammar for someone else to deal with, but as for 
understanding "zonah" as "innkeeper", this follows the well-known comment by 
Rashi, that Rahab sold "mazon" - "food". I've never bothered to look it up, 
but I assume that Rashi was following a midrashic source, in which Rahab's 
occupation is "cleaned up"; since she recognized God and helped the 
Israelites, she MUST have been a woman of virtue! Just so you know, this is 
the "clean" version that many Jewish children are taught - it is interesting 
that is has "spilled over" into Christian interpretation as well.

The midrash also claims that Rahab ended up marrying Joshua. According to 
the Christian version in Mattew 1:4, Rahab is the wife of Salmon, mother of 
Boaz who married Ruth and was the great-grandfather of David. Both versions, 
of course, are intended to convey various messages.

Yigal Levin


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jason Hare" <jaihare AT gmail.com>
To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, May 30, 2007 8:04 PM
Subject: [b-hebrew] Joshua 2:1 and 17, Questions


> Dear B-Hebrew,
>
> Last night I read a couple of chapters of Joshua for leisure, and
> there are a couple of things that I noticed that I wanted to ask
> about:
>
> (1) Although $BW(H /shevu'ah/ [שבועה] is feminine, it is modified with
> the masculine ZH /zeh/ [זה] in 2:17:
>
> נְקִיִּם אֲנַחְנוּ מִשְּׁבֻעָתֵךְ הַזֶּה אֲשֶׁר הִשְׁבַּעְתָּנוּ
> NQYM )NXNW M$B(TK HZH )$R H$B(TNW
>
> Come to think of it, why is H$B(TNW masculine, when it is talking about 
> Rahab?
>
> (2) Is there any reason why the NIV footnote says that the word ZWNH
> /zonah/ [זונה] can be translated as "innkeeper"?
>
> Thanks,
> Jason
> Joplin, MO > Ra'anana (Israel)
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