Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Joel C. Salomon" <joelcsalomon AT gmail.com>]

On 11/10/2009 12:45 AM, Yigal Levin wrote:
> I think that the problem is that you insist on using Aristotelian logic on an Ancient Near Eastern text. When the 
> Bible says that God caused water to irrigate "all" of the land, the ancient readers understood that 
> "all" means "all of the land that it would be appropriate to irrigate". The fact that the very 
> next verse implies that there was still "dry dust" around is proof of this.

It may be appropos to note that S. R. Hirsch interprets “אדמה” as “land 
suitable for work by Man” (actually reversing the common אדם-אדמה 
etymology).

—Joel C. Salomon