Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Harold Holmyard <hholmyard3 AT earthlink.net>]

Hi, Yitzhak,

Please let me add something to what I said earlier.

> I think your reading of Num 35 is very very forced.  If the author
> went through the trouble of differentiating iron from wood or stone,
> and metal weapons were generally available also in bronze, it
> would have been appropriate to add a listing for bronze.  The fact
> that you must take this interpretation to sustain your view really
> speaks for the strength of the argument.  However, your
> interpretation, even if in my opinion very very forced,  does address
> the questions I brought upon the verse (and others like it).
>   

HH: I don't think it is forced. They obviously had bronze, since it is
mentioned a great deal. There was no need to enumerate every kind of
metal, since Moses was simply pointing to various large categories of
objects that could be used for murder:  metal, stone, and wood.

HH: The use of "iron" for metal could be a use of synecdoche:

synecdoche: A whole is represented by naming one of its parts (genus 
named for species), or vice versa (species named for genus).

The species (iron) would be put for the genus (metal). I did not check 
this carefully, but do we see the word "metal" in the OT? Did ancient 
Hebrew have that word? The word "metal" is sometimes used in English 
translations, but I do not see an exactly corresponding Hebrew word that 
describes the material.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard