Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Nir:

On Fri, Jan 11, 2013 at 7:19 AM, Nir cohen - Prof. Mat. <nir AT ccet.ufrn.br> wrote:

karl,

טוב מראה עינים מהלך־נפשׁ גם־זה הבל ורעות רוח

1. i think you should include with your questions an explanation
why you reject the usual interpretations, which remains an enigma
for most of us. i personally see nothing wrong with them here, that
would require a total grammatical reshuffle of the clause.

I’m not rejecting it as much as saying it has problems, problems also recognized by others. For example, the ESV has a very different translation than the LXX.

By the way, what grammatical reshuffle of the clause do you think is required? 

2. the formula TOV (noun1) M-(noun2) is the usual comparative in
hebrew, especially late BH and talmudic. in my opinion it fits
perfectly the available timing evidence for a late qohelet.
also note that HLK occurs here as a noun in smixut.

TWB as a comparative is used also in early BH, so it’s not a time indicator for when it was written. And in all times the Mem prefix is appended to that which it is compared. Yes, I noticed from the context, that HLK is a noun. A noun referring to the action of going about.

3. also GM-ZH in versicle b indicates reference to a noun, not a verb.
but, oddly, it refers to a SINGLE noun, though TWO are mentioned.

In this verse, the “noun” is the comparison that makes up the first half of the verse.

 

perhaps this was the background for your rejection in item 1. but
this is solved if e.g. you put versicle a in quotation marks!
as to versicle a, i suggest two possible readings:

   "eye evidence (objective) is better than mental cogitation (subjective)"

but this would perhaps put it in the 17th century AD! or:

   "one should prefer the senses to being absorbed with thoughts":

this sounds more suitable to an early post-exilic book. but the important
element in both is the quotation mark around them. thus, ZH refers not to any
of the two nouns, but to versicle a as a unit.

Exactly, so we’re agreed on the second half of the verse.

But how do you get “being absorbed with thoughts” from HLK NP$? 

nir cohen

Karl W. Randolph.