New answers tagged genesis
2
אֵ֥ת (et) is the direct-object marker in Biblical Hebrew. This is especially important in a language that is as flexible about word order as Hebrew is; without it, there wouldn't be a way to tell from grammar which noun in a noun-verb-noun construct is the subject and which is the object. (Context can disambiguate in many cases, but not all.) This word ...
-3
When I first saw a list of the Egyptian dynasties, the king before the first dynasty, Narmer (~ 3000 B.C.), reminded me of the Nimrod that is being discussed here. The shift of consonants in Genesis could have originated with the critical stance of the author and/or Nimrod's contemporaries (Shem? Heber?) towards this tyrant and his developments (same as ...
-2
If we perceive a godlikeness in a human (and we may) there is justice in seeing him (or her) as if we saw God. It is the beauty in the encounter of Jacob with Edom that he fears and honours his older (and betrayed) brother as he would fear the presence of God. The same we can appreciate with Paul when he reminds brothers of their love for him and how they ...
5
The confusion comes in part from imperfect translation. The commandment, in both Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, reads as follows:
לֹא-תַעֲשֶׂה לְךָ פֶסֶל, וְכָל-תְּמוּנָה, אֲשֶׁר בַּשָּׁמַיִם מִמַּעַל, וַאֲשֶׁר בָּאָרֶץ מִתָּחַת--וַאֲשֶׁר בַּמַּיִם, מִתַּחַת לָאָרֶץ.
Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor any manner of likeness, of any ...
2
The classic Jewish commentator Rashi quoting the Medrash and the Talmud says:
and Abraham weighed out to Ephron: עֶפְרֹן is spelled without a “vav,”
because he promised much but did not do even a little [i.e., he
promised the cave as a gift but took a great deal of money for it],
for he took from him large shekels, viz. centenaria [worth one ...
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