5 ms·

It's been eye opening to read books from the Old Testament in the word-by-word translation of ancient Hebrew. A lot of the semantic accretion over the millennia

It's been eye opening to read books from the Old Testament in the word-by-word translation of ancient Hebrew. A lot of the semantic accretion over the millennia comes off and you get a more raw iron age tribal wisdom glowing through. One example is that often Exodus goes from narrative to descriptions of genealogy tree in modern translations. It happens that words interpreted as names of people are also abstract nouns and these passages can also be read as aphorisms. I haven't looked deep into that but it makes way more sense to me that narrative is punctuated by such reflections on "Wisdom unites with Patience and beget Lasting Wealth than breaking into describing marriages and lineages then going back to the story...

ntdef 2mo ago
Yes! In that vein, The Five Books of Moses by Robert Alter[1] is great for folks who want to get a better sense of what the original Hebrew might feel like rendered in English. [1]: https://www.amazon.com/Five-Books-Moses-Translation-Commentary/dp/0393333930 https://www.amazon.com/Five-Books-Moses-Translation-Commenta...
ButlerianJihad 2mo ago
I've become intensely interested in the meanings of Biblical names. Of course, names are the words least likely to be translated into a plain meaning, and knowing a name's translation and connotations gives the opportunity to pierce the veil on some very important meanings, meanings that were patently obvious to anyone who actually spoke those languages. Discovering that "Jonah" can mean "dove" was certainly eye-opening. And re-reading that book in light of knowing this, quite interesting! In fact, the OT and NT alike sometimes even drop in-line translation/explanation of a name that they really want us to know. In that case, why not know all of them?
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
dev_dan_2 2mo ago
> descriptions of genealogy That in itself would still make a lot of sense to me though; as far as I know, property and power was mainly transfered through the lines of first born males (so a patriarchy, in the literal sense). If that, social status and so on hinges on who your father, grandfather etc. was, then I think it makes sense for geneology trees to be something important enough to write down, especially in literature that was partially written to capture/produce a peoples cultural identity (i.e. parts of the creation story where written while the jews where forcibly integrated into the babylonian empire, and struggling to keep their own cultural identity. That's another good "use case" for genealogy, I would say.)
- agaj-nimm 2mo ago
  That's a bit of an oversimplification. I understand the historical value of genealogy but don't assume all past societies were uniformly practicing some form of entail and primogeniture. There is no definitive reading of scripture, there is no definitive version of any of the texts, and I enjoy finding new aspects of their history and interpretation. Realizing that some of the texts that read as genealogy might have been originally a form of poetic aphorism is something I wouldn't affirm to a bible scholar but I enjoy thinking about it. Someone else said a lot of scripture was written as poetry. Imagine people in the year 4500 trying to figure out some fourth hand translation of clippings taken from books by Neruda, Chaucer and Hobsbawm.
  - dev_dan_2 2mo ago
    Nono, I was refering specifically to the culture and time period in which the old testament was composed, not other cultures or time periods - those were clearly patriarchical, it would be a mistake to dismiss that when interpreting the old testament. Considering the culture in which a written artifact was composed is one of the main pilars that hermeneutics relies on (but obviously not the only one)
    - agaj-nimm 2mo ago
      Let's start with "time period in which the old testament was composed" When was that exactly? I believe the oldest extant versions are from around 300 AD. We have a rough idea of when certain books might have been written, but that is open to debate, and strong arguments have been made that put the origin of certain parts of these books centuries apart. Even the composition of a 'canonical' version of these books collections is not really clear before a certain point that is several centuries removed from the time in which we think they might have been originally written. Different books or even different parts of a book (even what constitutes a 'book' in the old or new testament is not well defined for any given time period before a certain point from when we have some evidence of a certain standardization at a certain place - which doesn't even mean all traditions everywhere using these books follow that same standard from that point onward) might have been written at times centuries apart and might have originated in different cultures. My point is, sweeping statements about customs and practices of specific societies as they were between one and three millennia ago is very hard to make. Even something like "the people who wrote this book clearly practiced primogeniture" is packed with lots of assumptions. And if we could know that a certain part of some scripture was from a definite time period and originally written in a certain language... who wrote it? Where? What was the legal system there? Take another example, a period and people we have a lot of data about: in XVII century England, for example, primogeniture and entail were standard... for the elite. Not for the middle class. You see what I'm getting at? Put simply, what I meant with my previous comment was: we have literally no idea if the people who wrote these supposed genealogies in Exodus were in fact practicing these inheritance legal forms you mentioned.
0xcafefood 2mo ago
> often Exodus goes from narrative to descriptions of genealogy tree in modern translations I think you were emphasizing something beside this, but if you want to know _why_ the five Books of Moses often jump suddenly into genealogy or minutiae of interest only to priests, you might be interested in the Documentary Hypothesis. Friedman's "Who Wrote the Bible?" is an approachable introduction to it.
- agaj-nimm 2mo ago
  Appreciate it but I'm already deeply into bible authorship. Many of my professors in college were bible scholars. Fascinating field really. Ancient history is much like astrophysics and cosmology. We know so very little and there are so many blanks. It sometimes catches me off guard that people think our past is well known.
  - 0xcafefood 2mo ago
    Cool! In that case, let me ask you: what books would you recommend on the topic?
    - agaj-nimm 2mo ago
      Ancient history scholarship is very accessible, most of it is published on periodicals that offer free download of articles. I recommend searching books and articles about 'canaanite religion' - the cult of El, Baal and Yaveh have a lot in common. You need to understand the context of Israelite religion to realize that modern monotheism wasn't created in a vacuum, it matured out of a deep tradition of local cults. I'd also recommend looking into Mesopotamian religions. Egyptian religion is not as fundamental but it provides a lot of perspective. Once you see the influence, it sheds light on a lot of things. The relationship between the cults of Set and the conflicting beliefs of followers of El and Baal is a fascinating rabbit hole. Greek mythology also acquires a whole new depth to it when you realize that Baal (a canaanite deity), El (an israelite deity that eventually merges with some others into the monotheistic god) and Zeus: all were storm gods. There's a lot more to it all I'm saying, again, look into that. Fascinating stuff. There is an amazing channel on youtube I wholeheartedly recommend: Esoterica https://www.youtube.com/@TheEsotericaChannel https://www.youtube.com/@TheEsotericaChannel A couple of good books I still remember are Belief by Orsi and Ancient Israel by Lemche. Some journals off the top of my head: Religion Compass https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17498171/current https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17498171/current Journal of the American Society for Premodern Asia https://lockwoodonlinejournals.com/index.php/jaos https://lockwoodonlinejournals.com/index.php/jaos I'd say go on Semantic Scholar, Academia.edu, or some other academic search tool and start digging! Bible authorship is a minor branch of a deep well of scholarship that is the study of ancient history and ancient religion.

ntdef 2mo ago

Yes! In that vein, The Five Books of Moses by Robert Alter[1] is great for folks who want to get a better sense of what the original Hebrew might feel like rendered in English. [1]: https://www.amazon.com/Five-Books-Moses-Translation-Commentary/dp/0393333930 https://www.amazon.com/Five-Books-Moses-Translation-Commenta...

ButlerianJihad 2mo ago

I've become intensely interested in the meanings of Biblical names. Of course, names are the words least likely to be translated into a plain meaning, and knowing a name's translation and connotations gives the opportunity to pierce the veil on some very important meanings, meanings that were patently obvious to anyone who actually spoke those languages. Discovering that "Jonah" can mean "dove" was certainly eye-opening. And re-reading that book in light of knowing this, quite interesting! In fact, the OT and NT alike sometimes even drop in-line translation/explanation of a name that they really want us to know. In that case, why not know all of them?

deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]

dev_dan_2 2mo ago

> descriptions of genealogy That in itself would still make a lot of sense to me though; as far as I know, property and power was mainly transfered through the lines of first born males (so a patriarchy, in the literal sense). If that, social status and so on hinges on who your father, grandfather etc. was, then I think it makes sense for geneology trees to be something important enough to write down, especially in literature that was partially written to capture/produce a peoples cultural identity (i.e. parts of the creation story where written while the jews where forcibly integrated into the babylonian empire, and struggling to keep their own cultural identity. That's another good "use case" for genealogy, I would say.)

agaj-nimm 2mo ago
That's a bit of an oversimplification. I understand the historical value of genealogy but don't assume all past societies were uniformly practicing some form of entail and primogeniture. There is no definitive reading of scripture, there is no definitive version of any of the texts, and I enjoy finding new aspects of their history and interpretation. Realizing that some of the texts that read as genealogy might have been originally a form of poetic aphorism is something I wouldn't affirm to a bible scholar but I enjoy thinking about it. Someone else said a lot of scripture was written as poetry. Imagine people in the year 4500 trying to figure out some fourth hand translation of clippings taken from books by Neruda, Chaucer and Hobsbawm.
- dev_dan_2 2mo ago
  Nono, I was refering specifically to the culture and time period in which the old testament was composed, not other cultures or time periods - those were clearly patriarchical, it would be a mistake to dismiss that when interpreting the old testament. Considering the culture in which a written artifact was composed is one of the main pilars that hermeneutics relies on (but obviously not the only one)
  - agaj-nimm 2mo ago
    Let's start with "time period in which the old testament was composed" When was that exactly? I believe the oldest extant versions are from around 300 AD. We have a rough idea of when certain books might have been written, but that is open to debate, and strong arguments have been made that put the origin of certain parts of these books centuries apart. Even the composition of a 'canonical' version of these books collections is not really clear before a certain point that is several centuries removed from the time in which we think they might have been originally written. Different books or even different parts of a book (even what constitutes a 'book' in the old or new testament is not well defined for any given time period before a certain point from when we have some evidence of a certain standardization at a certain place - which doesn't even mean all traditions everywhere using these books follow that same standard from that point onward) might have been written at times centuries apart and might have originated in different cultures. My point is, sweeping statements about customs and practices of specific societies as they were between one and three millennia ago is very hard to make. Even something like "the people who wrote this book clearly practiced primogeniture" is packed with lots of assumptions. And if we could know that a certain part of some scripture was from a definite time period and originally written in a certain language... who wrote it? Where? What was the legal system there? Take another example, a period and people we have a lot of data about: in XVII century England, for example, primogeniture and entail were standard... for the elite. Not for the middle class. You see what I'm getting at? Put simply, what I meant with my previous comment was: we have literally no idea if the people who wrote these supposed genealogies in Exodus were in fact practicing these inheritance legal forms you mentioned.

0xcafefood 2mo ago

> often Exodus goes from narrative to descriptions of genealogy tree in modern translations I think you were emphasizing something beside this, but if you want to know _why_ the five Books of Moses often jump suddenly into genealogy or minutiae of interest only to priests, you might be interested in the Documentary Hypothesis. Friedman's "Who Wrote the Bible?" is an approachable introduction to it.

agaj-nimm 2mo ago
Appreciate it but I'm already deeply into bible authorship. Many of my professors in college were bible scholars. Fascinating field really. Ancient history is much like astrophysics and cosmology. We know so very little and there are so many blanks. It sometimes catches me off guard that people think our past is well known.
- 0xcafefood 2mo ago
  Cool! In that case, let me ask you: what books would you recommend on the topic?
  - agaj-nimm 2mo ago
    Ancient history scholarship is very accessible, most of it is published on periodicals that offer free download of articles. I recommend searching books and articles about 'canaanite religion' - the cult of El, Baal and Yaveh have a lot in common. You need to understand the context of Israelite religion to realize that modern monotheism wasn't created in a vacuum, it matured out of a deep tradition of local cults. I'd also recommend looking into Mesopotamian religions. Egyptian religion is not as fundamental but it provides a lot of perspective. Once you see the influence, it sheds light on a lot of things. The relationship between the cults of Set and the conflicting beliefs of followers of El and Baal is a fascinating rabbit hole. Greek mythology also acquires a whole new depth to it when you realize that Baal (a canaanite deity), El (an israelite deity that eventually merges with some others into the monotheistic god) and Zeus: all were storm gods. There's a lot more to it all I'm saying, again, look into that. Fascinating stuff. There is an amazing channel on youtube I wholeheartedly recommend: Esoterica https://www.youtube.com/@TheEsotericaChannel https://www.youtube.com/@TheEsotericaChannel A couple of good books I still remember are Belief by Orsi and Ancient Israel by Lemche. Some journals off the top of my head: Religion Compass https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17498171/current https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17498171/current Journal of the American Society for Premodern Asia https://lockwoodonlinejournals.com/index.php/jaos https://lockwoodonlinejournals.com/index.php/jaos I'd say go on Semantic Scholar, Academia.edu, or some other academic search tool and start digging! Bible authorship is a minor branch of a deep well of scholarship that is the study of ancient history and ancient religion.