Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Gad:

What I don’t like about the translation “sanctify” is that the present
English use that I have seen is limited to the theological realm. On the
other hand, my understanding of the Hebrew use is that it has a root meaning
of being set apart, only secondarily the theological meaning of being
sanctified. However, as Tanakh is primarily a theological tome, the
theological meaning vastly predominates in numbers of uses.

A few places, such as Exodus 19:5 or Ezra 9:2 are borderline cases, where
the idea of set apartness and sanctification seem equally applicable, while
Lamentations 4:1 in its context refers to stones that are valuable (like
diamonds) hence set apart, not to sanctification.

A similar situation exists with X+) “to err”, i.e. “to miss the target”. but
only in Judges 20:16 is it clear that it does not carry the theological
meaning (though as I read the text, there are a few, very few, other places
where I think the meaning of erring fits better than sinning).

I have not made a systematic study on this question (there are well over 600
verses that contain some variation on QD$) but it is just something I have
noticed while reading the text that sometimes the context carries the idea
of set apartness equally or more so than the idea of sacredness.

Karl W. Randolph.

On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 4:36 AM, G. Zack <atdgz AT hotmail.com> wrote:

>
> Would "sanctify" do or almost so, as one of the dictionary entries to it
> is: "To give social or moral sanction to", very close to "set apart", as
> "set apart" is a social act of sorts, not a random act?
>
>
> Gad Za"k