Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Doug Belot" <dbelot AT bigpond.net.au>]

Hi , I wonder could anyone help me with gender words in Is 62:5 , "And your 
sons will marry you" , does hebrew demand this be "sons marry you" , it 
seems some translation alter this to "build" you or some such that does not 
suggest a "marry" need be involved or indeed the "sons" .

I just thought that while your obviously on Hos 1-2 and masculine and 
feminine you could help me nail this verse down.


doug belot



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Olivier Randrianjaka" <rev_oli AT hotmail.com>
To: <chavoux AT gmail.com>
Cc: "b-hebrew Forum" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 7:01 PM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] how to translate Hosea 1:2 (Olivier Randrianjaka)


> Hi Chavoux Luyt,
> Thanks for your comments. It is true that some feminine nouns may take 
> masculine ending, but it is still not possible in our case here since 
> אִשָּׁה (Hos 1.2) is singular not plural. I mean if your argument is 
> right, then אִשָּׁה  must be in plural since in Hebrew both noun and its 
> defining adjective accord in genre and number. The point is that זנונים 
> does not play an adjective role here but may be a stand alone noun, as 
> someone has argued earlier, but then how could we translate it?
> Regards,
> Olivier Randrianjaka
>
> > Date: Tue, 8 Mar 2011 10:41:06 +0200
> > Subject: Re: how to translate Hosea 1:2 (Olivier Randrianjaka)
> > From: chavoux AT gmail.com
> > To: rev_oli AT hotmail.com
> > CC: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> >
> > Hi Olivier
> >
> > > My comments:
> > > The problem is that the translation "a prostitute woman or wife" is not 
> > > linguistically appropriate since the adjective following the
> > > feminine noun אִשָּׁה in construct state is actually in masculine 
> > > plural זנונים which makes the above translation impossible.
> > I am not too sure of this, because there are some feminine nouns
> > taking the "masculine" plural (e.g. Beitzah -> Beitzim) and the other
> > way round (Ab -> Abot). So it is at least  _possible_ that zonah takes
> > the masculine plural in this case.
> >
> > >I would prefer the translation "woman of prostitution" or "woman 
> > >practicing a sacred prostitution" than the common "prostitute
> > >woman" which is not fitting linguistically and theologically.
> > And I would agree with you here.
> >
> > Regards
> > Chavoux Luyt
>
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