Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Nir cohen - Prof. Mat." <nir AT ccet.ufrn.br>]

to george attas, ishnian

i believe that ishnian's "patch" may be relevant in cloths, 
leather and maybe even for metals, as in ancient times soft metal 
pieces were often heated and then hammered/patched into a single 
sheet. thus, i see "patch" and "hammer" as complementary, rather 
than contradictory.

interestly, several permutations of RQ(=patch?) convey an 
opposite idea for cohesiveness: QR( (to tear/rip apart), 
Q(R (concave), (RQ (to desert), (QR (rip off, remove).

i would like to see the semitic use of RQ( as "patch", of which i 
am unaware. [in hebrew there are the associated hebrew verb 
RQM (patch, sew), RKK (softened), and HRKYB (combined), RWQN 
(emptied), RYQ (void) but the relation is unclear at best.]

interesting is RKS, which as a verb means (nowadays) "to button", 
but as a biblical noun means a mountainhead or cordillera (a
lifted/expanded(??) surface?), again somewhat a long shot, though
S-C and K-Q interchanges were not uncommon).

then, connected to RQ( (stomp) there is the hebrew RC/RQD (run, dance), 
which may also come from stomping. interestingly, RQD in arabic 
is ... "run", not "dance". if we take the semitic origin to be RQC,
and observe that NWS admitted the change of cadi and ayin
(as in the word "earth", hebrew )RC or aramaic )R(H ), the 
association is not so improbable.

to furuli,

i agree that we should be flexible about the ever-changing etymologies. but
the changes are also not arbitrary, and usually can be explained in terms of
basic laws (generalization, specification, re-distribution etc).  
frankly, i simply fail to see the GENERAL IDEA of spacial expansion in any of
the places mentioned by karl. he cannot simply claim that HRQY( L$XQYM
means "expanded the skies" or "expanded himself towards the skies" just
because $XQ is traslated as cloud (is it?), which is "expandible". [i 
suggest a separate thread on $XQ!] the IDEA of expansion is simply too 
unnatural to the context in job 37:18, in my opinion. [i admit that in 
this phrase i might be biased by modern hebrew: ARQIA (or )RQY( in our
notation) is the name of an israeli air company].

nir cohen

attas: >> The gloss of 'patch' that you refer to is indeed legitimate, but in
reference to clothing. The idea has to be modified when talking bout the sky.
 I can't see the notion of seven heavens in this. Perhaps you have some
further evidence to support your semantic suggestion?