Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

Dear Pere,

BWR does indeed mean "pit", but mostly with the specific meaning of 
"water-hole" or "cistern". The fact that Gen. 37:24 takes the trouble of 
informing us that the BWR into which Joseph was tossed was dry means that we 
would otherwise assume that he would be in danger of drowning. However, I 
don't think that biblical Hebrew is all that rigid in its definitions. B)R 
(be'er - bet aleph resh) means "well". But if you look at 2 Sam. 23:15, 
there we have a B)R which is vocalized as "bor", as indeed it is spelled in 
the parallel 1 Chr. 11:17. So was the water of Bethlehem drawn from a "well" 
or from a "cistern"?

Yigal Levin


----- Original Message ----- 
From: <pporta AT oham.net>
To: "K Randolph" <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>; "B-Hebrew" 
<b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2008 6:56 AM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ecc 12:6: BWR


> Yes, Karl, BWR is "pit" rather than "well".
> Now, RCC means "to crush", not "to broke". But "WNRC", the word before
> HGLGL, has often be
> translated as "break" and not as "crush".
> And so, KJ writes:
>
> Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the
> pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.
>
> So, be so kind to excuse the mistake I made at writing about broken pieces
> of the wheel (which pieces would fall into the pit). If I understand you
> well, it is the whole wheel which is crushed and falls down into the pit.
>
> Pere Porta