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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Ecclesiastes 3:11

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  • From: Martin Shields <enkidu AT bigpond.net.au>
  • To: Bryant J.Williams III <bjwvmw AT com-pair.net>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ecclesiastes 3:11
  • Date: Sat, 3 Nov 2007 12:02:07 +1100

Bryant,

Karl is reading the "double negative" in pretty much the same way as I am, but translates העלם differently (yet still following a number of others). I think there are good grounds for understanding העלם as something like "eternity" since "from beginning to end" sounds a lot like a temporal reference, and עלם is often temporal (in whatever way "eternity" is temporal, we need to be careful not to read modern notions of eternity into the text), and that עולם in 3:14 has the meaning "eternity."

I'm not sure what Karl's "hidden things" are without which we cannot find what God is doing from beginning to end. He may be able to elucidate further.

Further, double negatives are more complex in English than you suggest. "No, that will never happen" is an example of an emphatic double negative with negative meaning. I think there is a similar range of possibilities in both Greek and BH.

Martin Shields,
Sydney, Australia.

On 03/11/2007, at 11:06 AM, Bryant J. Williams III wrote:

[Karl]
"...He even placed the hidden things in their hearts, without which they would
not know ..."

[Bryant]
Thank you, Karl. I will have to think your translation through a bit. It does
give a different nuance to the negatives. I know that in English the double
negative would turn a phrase into a positive, while Greek intensifies it or
turns it to a positive (OU MH vs MH OU), but would Hebrew do the same as the
English here is a good question.

Martin, et al, what do you think?





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