To: <kgraham0938 AT comcast.net>, <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ps 25:17
Date: Sat, 24 Sep 2005 20:36:39 -0500
kgraham: @Mark:
Hey are you the Mark from AOMIN chat room? If so it is me osoclasi. How is
it going? If not don't worry about this.
Mark: Nope, never heard of it, never been in a chat room.
> In Psalm 25:17 just about every translation takes the first word ZaROTH as
a
> construct, depending on LBaBiY, which they then take as the subject of the
> verb HiRCHiYBU.
kgraham: That is because of the feminine plural construct ending at the end
of SARWT. That requires that it be taken as a construct chain.
Mark: But that's by no means certain. The LXX understood it as a construct.
But the form is the same as a non-construct plural. The only two other times
that this exact form ZaROTH is used in the Hebrew Bible (Job 5:19 and Psalm
71:20, see also Psalm 46:2; Deut. 31:17 & 21) the form is definitely NOT
construct.
So it seems to me that the most natural reading, which requires no
re-division of the words of the MT, is to take the first three words as a
complete clause with the order: subject-object-verb: Troubles make my heart
wider.
Mark Eddy