Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>]

It appears to me that XUG is a variant of חך XEK (Job 12:11), the  
vault of the mouth'.
Also of חכה XIKAH (Is. 817), 'waited, stalled'. Also of XGG (Ps.  
42:5(4)),
'assemble, congregate, press together'. Also of חק XEQ ( 1Ki. 3:20),
'breast, enclosure (as created by embracing)'.

Thus, חוג הארץ XUG HA-AREC of Is. 40:22, as well as חוג  
שמים XUG $AMAYIM
of Job 22:14, as well as the XUG of Proverbs 22:14,
are all referring to the vault גג GAG (how "material" I don't know)  
of the sky.
"circle" is here in the sense of "a circle of friends", not in the  
sense of the
geometrical figure (recall this remarkable fact: among all curves of a
given circumference the circle encloses the largest area,
as do people pressing to be closer together.)

The מחוגה M-XUG-AH of Is. 44:13 is possibly a M-XUQ-AH.

The YA-XOG-U of Ps. 107:27 is possibly 'stalled'.

I think that the Hebrew bible is far off such macro-geographical  
considerations
as the "spherical" or "circular" shape of the earth, or any other  
"cosmological" matters.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Aug 26, 2012, at 12:30 AM, Jerry Shepherd wrote:

> the material vault of heaven