In the culture of the Ancient Hebrews, different parts of the body reflect different aspects of the person. These parts and aspects make up the nephesh, a Hebrew word that is often translated as "soul."
,1,A 10 minute video that demonstrate how to use the Ancient Hebrew Lexicon to do word studies and uncover the original meaning of Hebrew words as they are related to the Hebrew culture.
,1,Introducing Mr. Benner's new and unique translation of the Torah, available online, as an eBook or in hardcover.
https://www.mechanical-translation.org/
,1,Jeff’s Patreon page and his Psalms Blog – http://www.patreon.com/jeffbenner
After working on my translation of the Torah (http://www.mechanical-translation.org) for the past 15 years, of which I am coming close to completing, my next translation project is the Book of Psalms.
If you are not familiar with my Mechanical Translation, let me explain it using Psalm 1, which I have already completed. This is the Mechanical Translation, where each Hebrew word, prefix and suffix is translated the same way all the time. This is the first Hebrew word, ashrey, and wherever this word appears, I translate it as “Happy.” The second word is ha’ish, which includes the prefix “ha” meaning “the” and the noun “ish” meaning “man.” This is the Revised Mechanical Translation where I re-arrange the words so that the verse will read easier for the English reader.
I am hosting my Psalms Blog on Patreon where I will post updates on my progress, share examples of the translation, ask your opinions on different aspects of the translation and most importantly, share with you what I am learning and also hear from you what you are learning.
To get started, go to my Patreon Page, Link provided in the description of this video, and click on "follow." This way you will be notified of all new public posts. Or you can click on "Become a Patron" and for a small monthly subscription, you will get the benefit of additional posts and special benefits. Whichever way you decide to participate, if you so choose, I look forward to seeing you over there.
Coming up next will be my translations of Psalms chapters 19, 24, 62 and 100 at the request of my Patrons.
,1,"How to do a Hebrew word study without knowing Hebrew"
(http://ancient-hebrew.org/bookstore/classes-study.html)
I was asked to provide some insight into the word “commit” from the following passage and interpret it from a Hebraic perspective.
Commit thyself unto Jehovah; Let him deliver him: Let him rescue him, seeing he delighteth in him. (ASV, Psalm 22:8)
As I began my investigation into this word and its meaning within the context of the verse, I quickly realized that this verse would make an excellent case study to show how important it is to understand Hebrew vocabulary, poetry and philosophy when studying the Bible.
Before we get into the meaning of the Hebrew word for “commit,” we need to understand that this verse is written with a chiastic structure, a form of poetry common to Biblical Hebrew, especially the book of Psalms. Here is how this verse can be written, showing the chiastic structure.
1a. Commit thyself unto Jehovah
1b. Let him deliver him
2b. Let him rescue him
2a. Seeing he delighteth in him
If you will notice, 1a is parallel with 2a and 1b is parallel with 2b. Also notice that the words “deliver” and “rescue” are synonyms, words with very similar meanings. This is another common form of Hebrew poetry called parallelisms. This means that the words “commit” and “delight” are also synonyms. Of course, these two words are not synonyms in the English language, which means we need to find out what these words mean in the Hebrew language.
The Hebrew word translated as “commit” is the Hebrew verb galal (Strong’s #1556), which Strong’s dictionary defines as “to roll (literally or figuratively)” and in the KJV Bible this word is translated as commit, remove, roll (away, down, together), run down, seek occasion, trust, wallow.
The Hebrew language is a concrete language, which means that words with a concrete meaning are used to express abstract ideas. So to really understand the concrete meaning of this word, let’s look at some of the verses that use this word in a concrete way.
…and they rolled the stone from the well's mouth… (KJV, Genesis 29:3)
And Amasa wallowed in blood in the midst of the highway… (KJV, 2 Samuel 20:12)
…in the desolation they rolled themselves upon me. (KJV, Job 30:14)
So, why did the translators translate this word meaning “to roll” as “commit” in Psalm 22:8? Because “roll over to Yahweh” is not how we speak in English, so they translated this concrete word with an abstract one in order for the English reader to be “more comfortable” with the verse.
Now let’s take a look at the word “delight.” This is the Hebrew verb hhapheyts (Strong’s #2654), which Strong’s defines as “properly to incline to; by implication (literally but rarely) to bend; figuratively to be pleased with, desire.” The KJV translates this word as delight, please, desire, will, pleasure, favour, like, move and would. All of these words are abstract, with the exception of “move,” so let’s take a look at the verse where the word hhapheyts is translated as “move.”
He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. (KJV, Job 40:17)
I have found the book of Job to be an ancient dictionary to the Ancient Hebrew language. What I mean by this is that Hebrew words are often used in a figurative sense, except in the book of Job, where the vocabulary is more frequently used in a concrete way and is very useful in uncovering the concrete meaning of a word.
This word apparently means “to wag,” like a dog does with his tail when it is excited, and figuratively this word means “to be delightfully happy.” Because this word is a synonym with galal, we can conclude that galal more literally means “to roll over in excitement.”
Now that we understand the Hebrew words galal and hhapheyts, let’s put the concrete meanings of these words into Psalm 22:8
Roll thyself over to Jehovah; Let him deliver him: Let him rescue him, seeing he wags in him.
By interpreting the Bible this way, we can better see into the mind, culture and philosophy of the Ancient Hebrew people.
If this type of study is something you are interested in doing, let me recommend my course, "How to do a Hebrew word study without knowing Hebrew" (http://ancient-hebrew.org/bookstore/classes-study.html).
,1,In the culture of the Ancient Hebrews, different parts of the body reflect different aspects of the person. These parts and aspects make up the nephesh, a Hebrew word that is often translated as "soul."
