Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Nick Ashton <hisnibbs AT ntlworld.com>]

Hi,
am I right in thinking that when I read that the root of a hebrew word 
is such and such,
that was it's original; meaning, before the klanguage developed and was 
applied to other things?


Perhaps you could also comment on this particular example I was 
considering:-
H3117
???
yo?m
yome
From an unused root meaning to be hot; a day (as the warm hours), 
whether literally
(from sunrise to sunset, or from one sunset to the next), or 
figuratively (a space of time
defined by an associated term), (often used adverbially): - age,  . . .

*So, originally it signified 12 hours, but was later used to mean a 
longer period of time.*

e.g. 1:- Gen.2:4* *"in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the 
heavens,"

it has the preposition /be/ before /yom/, _unlike_ in Gen.1
As such it is an idiom for "when"

e.g. 2:- "in the day /(b-yom)/ that the Lord spake with Moses in mount 
Sinai. " (Num.3:1)

. .though it seems from the amount of detail Moses brought down that 
God was speaking to him for more than one day, he was gone for 40 days.