The more serious issue with what you write is that Hebrew words are not formed as compounds in the way you suggest. There is ample evidence of the history of the Hebrew word elohim, which has cognates in other Semitic languages including the well known Arabic allah, proving that it cannot be a compound with a Hebrew verb “to be”.

Thank you visiting the Freeware Bible – and for posting ou our message board

It seems clear, from the tone of your post that the translation database has angered or offended you. If that is so, please accept my apology.

I would like to address the pronunciation issues that you raised.

You may already be aware that nobody can say with any level of certainty how any of these words were pronounced when they were first composed. Biblical scholars agree that the Bible was composed orally and then passed from generation to generation for hundreds – maybe thousands of years – before they were first written. Current estimates are that most of the Bible was composed during the Bronze Age, 2000 to 1700BCE, and then transcribed 1000 to 500BCE. (see, e.g. Amy Jill Levine, Introduction to the Old Testament)

And, most scholars also agree that the Bible’s was not first spoken in Hebrew, because the Jews did not speak Hebrew at the time the Bible was composed. (See, e.g. Cambridge History of the Bible, “The creation story and the story of the tower of Babel imply that Hebrew was the original language of mankind. When we turn from folk legend to linguistic origins, however, Hebrew does not appear to have been the original language of the Hebrews themselves… it was probably a tribal dialect of the Old Aramaic.”

And, those vocalization guides (what you call “points”) that appear in Bible texts were added hundreds – sometimes thousands – of years after the first writings. The people who added them were showing how to read the Bible aloud in their modern dialect, so of course differ significantly from one modern text to the next.

But, Peter, whether you pronounce he word “el” or “al” it clearly means ‘power’ or ‘god’ every where it appears in the Bible. Whether or not there is an “o” after the “i” the “hi” means “to be”. And, regardless which modern Hebrew dialect you speak, you know that the suffix ‘im’ indicates plurality. And, of course, you don’t have to take my word for any of this; you can look up the word in any Bible concordance.

I hope this sheds some light on your pronunciation concerns and doesn’t increase your personal heat level.

Best,

Bill

Thank you for writing – and for citing Jaraslov Pelikan’s excellent book.
I visited your weblog – e4unity – and admire and appreciate you efforts to bring people together.

Best,

Bill

Thank you for taking the time to read the Freeware Bible and to write a thoughtful critique. I agree with much of what you are writing about the history of the Bible – yes it is remarkable and wonderful how close the Bible transcriptions are to each other even though they come from hundreds of years and hundreds of miles apart. Many of the differences are minor – though some are quite different especially some of the ones in the Second Testament. You may be interested in Gary Rendsburg’s extensive studies of the first testament and Paul Erdman’s work on the second.

But what the point that you are really trying to make is that the Bible divinely inspired – I have to tell you that I agree with you that it is certainly is. Where we disagree over the to nature of the voice of God – I believe in the Latin maxim – Vox Populi Vox Dios – the voice of “The people is the voice of God” and that the prophets and rabbis who wrote Genesis were inspired by the spirit of their communities. My guess (and please feel free to correct me if I’m wrong here) is that you believe that God gave us the Torah on Mount Sinai – believe me, I believed that until I started studying the history of the Bible and found mountains of evidence to the contrary.

As to my grasp of the English language – your point is well taken – I had a respectable academic career, but am pretty sure that was in spite of, not due to my writing ability.

As to Aramaic/Hebrew, the Freeware Bible database organizes information from sources that are a lot more respected that you or me. For example, Rabbinical Association – after study of hundreds of years of Midrash conclude that brashit/br’syt can mean principles. All of the Bible concordances say that the word comes from the root word for head – from which, of course spring a wide range of words from principal, to principles, to beginning, summit.

Michael, it seems that you very much want the Bible to say what you think it means – and there nothing wrong with that.

What the Freeware Bible database does is show all of the possible meanings of each word so that others can have the opportunity to read the ancient scripture for themselves.

Best,

Bill

Thank you for taking the time to share your views on evolution and religion. I must admit that know next to nothing about UFOs. I’d like to I ask you a loaded question – why don’t our our military defense systems detect the presence of UFO’s ? . . . or do they?

Best,

Bill