Biblical Hebrew Forum

[David Kolinsky <hadeesh AT sbcglobal.net>]

George,

Not that I want to agree or disagree on the Circle / Sphere issue.  But I did 
want to give the following input:

KNP (wing) is related to KNS (to enter), KNN (to wind around), KN\ (to 
humble, 
oppress), and Kinereth which all mean "to draw inward" and does not 
necessarily 
imply edge.

QTsH (end) comes from the word QTsTs meaning "to cut off" and does imply 
"edge".  But QTsTs comes from QTsH whose paal verb means "to scrape (back)" a 
verb derived from QWTs "to loathe" literally meaning "to retract away from."

Thanks,
David Kolinsky
Monterey, CA

>From chavoux AT gmail.com  Thu Aug 23 13:59:18 2012
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Shalom

SHINAN:
> Then, how would you explain the phrase: The " FOUR CORNERS" of the earth
in (Isaiah 11:12)? The very same idea is
> expressed in Greek in the Revelation to Saint John Chapter 7
><snip>
> We all know that a 'SPHERE' does not have angles! (especially four of
them as expressed in the Scriptures)
But neither does a circle!
.
> Instead the idea of an unambiguous term for SPHERE could only by
expressed in Hebrew by using the term 'duwr' (see Strong > # 1754 ): a
ball/sphere; see Isa 22:18 below:
>
> "He will surely violently turn and toss thee [like] a BALL into a large
country: there shalt thou die and there the chariots of thy
> glory [shall be] the shame of thy lord's house".
Unfortunately not unambiguous... Is. 29:3 וְחָנִיתִי כַדּוּר עָלָיִךְ
וְצַרְתִּי עָלַיִךְ מֻצָּב וַהֲקִֽימֹתִי עָלַיִךְ מְצֻרֹֽת׃
There is no way that anything spherical can lay siege to a city?

From: George Athas <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>
To: "b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
<snip>

> In terms of cosmology, I'm not reading a Middle Ages flat earth back into
> the Bible. Quite the opposite, actually. I'm reading forwards, not
> backwards—from antiquity into the Middle Ages. But as you say, the issue of
> חוג is a linguistic one. I'm yet to see any evidence that we should be
> interpreting this word as 'sphere'. I'm happy to change my mind on this,
> but please show the evidence. I know that some later cosmologies seem to
> have viewed the stars and planets as being embedded in spheres and orbs
> that rotated around the earth (the 'rolling spheres' of the beautiful hymn,
> 'Crown Him With Many Crowns'), but is there somewhere we can see this in
> biblical texts? Going by semantics and literary contexts, I've yet to see
> evidence that it's there. Appeal to possible future linguistic finds is not
> hard evidence, so I can't base my conclusion on that. Possible future
> linguistic finds might just as easily show that 'sphere' is an impossible
> translation. Who knows? It's meaningless to appeal to presently
> non-existent evidence which may not even show up anyway. Once again, I'm
> happy to be shown I'm wrong on this—I don't have a particular vested
> interest in the meaning of חוג. So I'm certainly open to your possibility.
> However, at present, I just can't see the evidence for 'sphere' in the
> texts and, therefore, have to conclude that it is implausible given the
> evidence.
>
I think the right question is maybe rather to ask if there is any word in
biblical Hebrew that unambiguously refer to "sphere" rather than circle? (I
know of the word "kadur" for ball in modern Hebrew, but I don't think it is
a biblical Hebrew word.) I would assume that both a circle and a sphere is
round and that this might be all that the word wants to imply. Just as we
have just one word "love" in English to translate various Greek words,
"chug" (חוג) probably have both the meaning of circle and sphere.

The appeal to the pillars as metaphorical also needs some evidence to
> overcome the seeming hurdles before it. Given that texts like Gen 1 see the
> sky as a panel of some kind 'up there' that holds water behind it—a panel
> which has windows in it that open, similar to the springs in the surface of
> the earth (cf. the biblical flood account), such that a catastrophic deluge
> bringing about an act of uncreation can occur—it seems eminently plausible
> to suggest that something holds that panel in place. The question is,
> "What?" Going by the biblical texts, it seems that pillars holding up the
> sky is most likely not purely metaphorical, but rather part of the
> cosmological architecture in the ancient mindset. We today read these
> 'pillars' as metaphorical (we have to!), but I don't see the evidence that
> the biblical writers saw them this way. In other words, the literary
> context suggests something other than what you've proposed. I will admit
> that your proposal is possible, but it doesn't in my estimation seem
> plausible.
>
I would think that anything written in poetic language is more likely to be
metaphorical rather than literal. Also the fact that there is no mention of
pillars in the (semi-)prosaic description of creation in Gen.1 would seem
to confirm that "pillars" is used metaphorically. Most of the "mythical"
interpretations of the ancient Hebrew world view (that I have read) seems
to understand that the heavens were seen as a dome rather than a panel,
though?

Although I don't think the case can be made that chug unambiguously means
"sphere", I don't think that the case for the opposite has been made
either.

Just my 2c
Chavoux Luyt