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NASB | Genesis 4:26 To Seth, to him also a son was born; and he called his name Enosh. Then men began to call upon the name of the LORD. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Genesis 4:26 To Seth, also, a son was born, whom he named Enosh (mortal man, mankind). At that [same] time men began to call on the name of the LORD [in worship through prayer, praise, and thanksgiving]. [Joel 2:32; Luke 3:38; Acts 2:21] |
Subject: Contra "Total Depravity" |
Bible Note: I wrote Joshua Johnson, a seminarian/student of Hebrew ("Hw") at Nazarene Theol Seminary for advice: Some folks, based on Jewish (Jwh) Targums (Tgm), say that the word "chalal" translated "began" in Gen.4:26(b) should instead be read w/ its other meaning of "profan[ing]" ending up w/ precisely the opposite meaning from our English (Enh) Bibles. Objectively speaking, how should 4:26(b) be rightly translated?" [Note to reader: translit's of the Hw can't be accurately reproduced below, incldng: "HLL" lacks a vowel point below the "H" and "huhal liqro" lacks a carat over the "u", a vwl pt under the 2nd "h", after the "q" there should appear a superscripted theta-like or e symbol (Sheva) and the "o" and both "a"s in "qara" should have long markings over them.] Answer: I’ll attempt to be as objective as I can be, Art. As far as Gen.4:26 is concerned, the phrase you are wrestling with is [Hw letters here omitted] (huhal liqro’), which the NASB translates as “began to call.” The 2nd word (liqro’) is easy enough. It is an infinitive form of the verb qara’, which means “to call, proclaim, read.” It is the 1st word (huhal) that has initiated some of the conversation you have alluded to. To answer this question with any specificity, I’ll have to give you a rudimentary crash course on Hw words in general and verbs in particular. W/o getting overly complicated, most Hw words are built on a 2 or 3-consonant basic form called a root. This root has a sort of foundational meaning which is then the building block of related words in all sorts of different parts of speech—e.g., verbs, nouns, adjectives, participles, etc. The root of the word in "?" (huhal) is [Hw X-ters omitted in this post] or HLL. This is where things get interesting. The particular word we are looking at in Gen.4:26 (huhal) is a verb. The verbs in Hw only have 2 tenses (Perfect;Imperfect). But, each verb can have several different verbal stems which have been derived from the basic root. Each stem has a slightly different meaning. You don’t need to know what each stem means, but it is important that you know that the same verb can have a substantially different meaning in different stems. In most of the verb stems derived from HLL the basic meaning is “pollute, defile, profane.” However, there is 1 verbal stem built on HLL which usually carries the meaning “to begin.” That stem is the Hiphil Stem (and its passive form, the Hophal Stem). Now, getting back to Gen.4:26, huhal (translated in the NASB “began”) is built on the Hophal Stem (specifically it is a Hophal Prfct 3rd masc. singlr). As I said earlier, the Hophal is the passive form of the Hiphil, and the word HLL in the Hiphil/Hophal usually means “to begin.” That is what you saw in your rsrch of the word in Genesis. HLL occurs as a verb in the Hiphil/Hophal stem in Gen.4:26, 6:1, 9:20, 10:8, 11:6, 41:54, and 44:12, and in all those cases our Enh translations have translated as “begin.” The other v. you mentioned--Gen.49:4--is indeed the only other occurrence of HLL in a verbal stem in the book of Gen., and you’ve noticed that our Enh translations translate it with the idea of “pollute, defile, profane.” The reason for that is because the word HLL is not in the Hiphil/Hophal stem in 49:4, but rather it is in the Piel Stem. In the Piel, HLL always means “pollute, defile, profane.” As far as the Aramaic Tgms go, you are correct that they are translations of the Hw into Aramaic done some time after the transltn of the LXX. I’m not sure how “loose” they are, but they're transltns and not the original. With that said, you're also correct to point out that the Tgms chose to translate the Hw HLL with its more common meaning “pollute, defile, profane” seeing the beginnings of idolatry in the passage, despite the word’s occurrence in the Hophal Stem in Gen. 4:26. However, none of the resources I consulted give much weight to the old Aramaic translation. Instead, every resource I consulted from Word Biblcl Commntry to The Expositor’s Bible Commntry to the classic Hw lexcn The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hw and Enh Lexcn to the industry standard advanced Hw grammar Gesenius’ Hw Grammar all unanimously agreed that the word HLL in Gen.4:26 should be translated “to begin.” Added to this heavy academic consensus, I fail to see how one might make sense of the passage if indeed the word HLL is to be translated as “defile” or “profane.” How would that go? “And then [men] were defiled to call on the name of the LORD”? The very presence of the passive form of the word combined with the following infinitive of “to call” seem to point towards the meaning “to begin.” So, as a short summary to the long answer I have provided: I think there is little doubt that our Enh translations, particularly the NASB, have translated Gen.4:26 correctly and that the intended reading is “began to call on the name of the LORD” with no sense of profaning or idolatry. |