New answers tagged psalms
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In Hebrew and other Semitic languages, it is standard for a group of males and females (even if there is only one male and the rest females) to be referred to by a masculine-gendered noun or pronoun. The Hebrew word is אַחִים (achim) in Psalms 133:1, meaning "brothers," but this is not necessarily to the exclusion of females, due to the rule mentioned above.
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I cannot explain why two different translators would come up with different meanings except to say they had different agendas. One agenda, I'm afraid, is the concept that sex is dirty or wrong, and the second is the Christian concept of "original sin." Neither of these is accepted in a Jewish reading of the Hebrew. With JPS translation, it is as follows:
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The Septuagint gives:
... en anomiais synelempsthen
kai en hamartiais ekkisesen me he meter mou
... amidst lawlessness I was conceived
and in erroneous expectations my mother longed with burning for me
It is not very likely that David intended to blame his mother for his own fault. With more probability he admitted the shame of one who was hoped for in ...
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"Born" is usually a conjugation of the verb ילד. However, in Hebrew, different words can have an overlap in meaning, and this appears to be the case with יחם. While יחם simply means "to be hot" (cp. Eze. 24:11), it may also be used idiomatically in the realm of sexuality, meaning "to be aroused." This phenomenon is not unlike that which occurs in many other ...
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See Natan Slifkin's book, Sacred Monsters: Mysterious and Mythical Creatures of Scripture, the Talmud and Midrash. He devotes the entire first chapter to Jewish versions of the unicorn myth. In that chapter he suggests that the tachash -- an animal described in the Bible whose skins were used to cover the Sanctuary -- may fit the myth.
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