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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Definite Article 7:14

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  • From: Harold Holmyard <hholmyard3 AT earthlink.net>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Definite Article 7:14
  • Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2007 19:09:14 -0500

Dear Joseph,

HH: It can serve most of the examples we've discussed, theoretically all of them, since it is a category of usage for which these examples are cited. And the thought could be the same in the reader's mind as in the writer's. It does not have to be, as you suggest, definite for one and indefinite for the other. It is equally definite and generic for both. The one who escapes, if we provisionally accept that idea for Gen 14:13, would be, in both writer and hearer, a genus: "the one who escaped," used specifically of an otherwise unidentified person who came to Abraham with news of Sodom.

JW:
This is non-responsive to my question above. If you are willing to try harder I suggest you try to answer my one important question above:
What examples would you give in the Hebrew Bible of the Author being Definite and the immediate Hebrew hearer taking it as Indefinite?

HH: I should have been clearer. If the context lacked a specific person that the hearer could identify, he might have been able to understand that the reference was generic and indefinite.
JW:
If I understand the category correctly it is something definite to the author that is indefinite to the immediate Hebrew hearer. I don't think there is any such category of Hebrew as the previous sentence has a natural contradiction. If someone did accept such a category than they would have a huge amount of Uncertainty regarding whether any Author meant the Definite or Indefinite. An uncertainty I have Faith you do not possess.

HH: Context could give clarification. If no virgin has been mentioned or is ever mentioned to the reader, he can gather that some other idea is in view than a clearly identified individual.

JW:
Well you might want to do a current survey of translations. I believe that now the majority of Christian translations have "the".

HH: True, but English allows a somewhat similar idea to the Hebrew use of the article that I learned. The reader can take "the virgin" as generic if he chooses to do so. It is the typical young woman in Israel. She gets pregnant, bears a child, and names him "Immanuel" because of the hope she has in God and his protection of Israel.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard





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