Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

karl,

>> Out of curiosity, where did you get that translation that you included?

MM = mechon mamre, one of the main jewish translations. see
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/

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karl,

this is my last email on this thread. clearly you are entrenched here and
we do not see eye to eye.

in general i do not ascribe to your repeated declarations that
"the king is naked". in spite of many doubts and errors, some
consensus is slowly being reached, which is not the caprice of
one particular interpretation as you like to describe it, but a true
pluralistic concensus. though it is not the final word, it is probably
close to the truth, and he who chooses, like you, to challenge it
by principle is bound to be wrong most [not necessarily all] of the
time. i believe job 15:28 is no exception.

>> I don’t see those verses as a mocking digression, rather the context seems
to indicate the wicked are like wearing various pieces of armor, the names of
which were long ago forgotten, the only one widely remembered is the boss of
the shield.

this explains why you (and, i believe, only you) have so many
difficulties with this chapter. you translate 25-27 differently than most sources.
yes, the guy is up in arms against god, but the arms are not at the thematic center here.
just as the dwindling of the cities is not at the thematic center of v 28. who is
at the thematic center is the wicked man, the rebel.

>> Ps. from the context, vs. 26 צואר appears to be shoulder to neck protection,
גבי מגיו bosses of his shields. Vs. 27 חלב some sort of face protection worn
in battle, while פימה a cuirass to protect his torso. These are
things used by a warrior in battle.

the words you claim describe types of armour (vv. 25-27) are NEVER
used biblically as such - and there is pretty ample description of armour
in the bible. so, you are basing your argument on 5 thin conjectures:

PYMH=cuirass ???,
KSL=(???),
XLB=face protection,
CW)R= neck armour,
GB (MGN)=back armour, back of armor

[clearly, had armour been the thematic center, i would have expected to
find one of the above: XRB, SIP, XNYT, RWMX etc: namely, assault arms
and not merely defensive armour. you cannot win a war with your shield.
see for example david's reference to goliath or other biblical references
to arms.]

let us revise the five terms one by one.

(I) pimah (used in modern hebrew to mean roughly a furuncle; older dialects: double chin)
biblically only appears in this very verse. but let me quote an arabic source:

The term פִּימָה (pimah), a hapax legomenon, is explained by the Arabic fa’ima,
“to be fat.” Pope renders this “blubber.” Cf. KJV “and maketh collops of fat
on his flanks.”
http://alkitab.sabda.org/passage.php?passage=Ayb%203:5%2011:6%2013:12%2015:25%2015:26%2015:27%2022:14%2023:16%2041:13%2041:15&tab=alt#n14

the arabic source is not likely to be a mere late derivative of the
biblical source, since it appears (only?) as a VERB in arabic, only as a
NOUN in hebrew. but the etymology is clearly the same: fat.

[oddly, PIMAH=fat has a finnish cognate mentioned in:
http://cslipublications.stanford.edu/koskenniemi-festschrift/kk-festschrift-all-2005.pdf
clearly i ignore this curiosity].

(II) KESEL appears biblically as part of the animal flesh (the rear part of the animal, associated with kidneys)
in several (repeated) verses on sacrifice: Lev 3:4, 4:9, 7:4. though repeated, they establish the same meaning.
for human flesh, see also Ps 38:8 where often the translation is loins.
all of them are consistent with fat, not with armour.

(III) needless to say, XLB is used biblically many many times, all
of them meaning just - milk or fat, not armour.

(IV-V) so, in this context, CW)R and GB can only mean one thing:
indicating a fat neck and a fat body.

to me, the accumulation of all these five expressions in just three
phrases can only indicate one thing: fat, not armour. admittedly,
the fat is being put in armour; but it is the fat which is being
described here, not the armour.

once the meaning of vv 25-27 is seen in this light, as a mocking of a fat
man up in arms, one may cross out vv 25-27 and read v 28 as if it were the
direct continuation of v. 24. suddenly all your difficulties have disappeared.

nir cohen

>> Verses 25–7 show the forcefulness of that rebellion against God, but 28 and
following show the end thereof. Yet the wicked person’s shaking his fist at
Got won’t succeed.

>> I see verse 28 as a picture of failure that awaits the wicked. In other
words, ruin.

>> Karl W. Randolph.