- Sorry – another background piece, that I have to assume is important.
Bereshit בראשית Genesis
Shemot שמות Exodus
Vayikra ויקרא Leviticus
Bamidbar במדבר Numbers
Devarim דברים Deuteronomy
Considerations, that help you understand how the language works. First, thinking of Genesis not just as ב in + ראשית beginning (from ראש head; chief – EDBH ראש p.237 begin; animate;; move energetically (E65)), but also as:
Bereshit בראשית as ברא + שית
● A comment about interchangeability of yod י and vav ו. For example, Nun, of Joshua son of Nun coming from the root נין. In use in Judaism, there is very common interchange. We have spoken of this some before, and talking about the fact that neither of them seems to change a great deal the meaning of a word. The big thing is that vav ו goes along with bet ב as in “in,” and yod י goes along with kaf כ as in “like,” and the understanding of being “in” something in Hebrew thought, is much like being “like” something. Therefore, it is not an unreasonable substitution. However, I have not included that in my studies that I share to this point, simply because that adds one more level of complexity, and for right now I think best to hold off. ● But, if one chooses in the future to go in that direction, the most fascinating result of that would be the explanation of lex talonis, “like for like,” being the same as “consequences קב.” I believe it is real. And maybe we’ll get there.
Above is a great example in the red boxes in numbers ten and eleven, under the root שות are occurrences appearing as שית, how it is being used in Judaism.
My concern for doing that gets to the qere/ketiv issue again – what is read out and what is written. Just making sure there is awareness. If one chose, instead of using שות here, what about using cognates or even cognate permutations of שית and compare? Probably with thousands of years of experience they have compared. But perhaps we should check some.
- Cognate permutations for שות are (instill/purge)
- Cognates for שות are (act surreptitiously/openly E4)
- Cognate permutations for שית are (attend and prepare)
- Cognates for שית are (concentrate attention E36)
It definitely is possible to see some overlap, as in grouping things together for cognates, and or cognate permutations. However, for now it seems safest for our purposes not to interchange vav and yod.
So, looking at ברא + שית, one might get something like “concentrate attention on the actualization/opening.” This, of course interchanges well with the traditional interpretation of “In the beginning.” Is there also an element of “acting surreptitiously/openly?” Knowing what we know of the Hebrew Scriptures, that is likely always true. The hidden meanings we have become very aware of.
The most interesting thing is actually what led me to this study in the first place, which we will follow through on. If we look at בראשית in another arrangement, we get ירא + שבת. (Of course שות and שבת are cognates, so we arrive with a shabbat שבת,sabbath, consideration either way.) These two roots I show below, but the realization bringing me here was the investigation of Genesis 2 with the root שבת giving a stand-alone word שמות, Shemot, “names,” the name of the second book of Torah in Hebrew, and then••• seeing our investigation of “to call” קרא in Genesis 2, and how its cognate permutations explain so much of how the language שׂפה works (hopefully we will get to all of this), AND see that קרא is cognate with ירא. 😳 AND the name of the next book in Torah••• Vayikra ויקרא “and he calls.”😳 😳 OK, I’m paying attention now.
Vayikra ויקרא Leviticus
So, obviously one looks at the traditional root קרא.
(Of all the roots looked at so far, קרא is the most helpful in understanding how the language works. There will be a detailed cognate permutation investigation in a later entry.) But see that there is also a “hidden meaning” (and of course there might be more – there are other possibilities). See there is ירא + וק. We show the root יראabove. But recall that the cognate permutations meaning of וק/קב is (consequences), discussed multiple times before. So the name of the book could be telling us to pay constant attention to the consequences of our actions (positive and negative).
Is there more? Most likely, but the inspiration brought me this far. We have spoken before that both Bamidbar במדבר, Numbers, and Devarim דברים, Deuteronomy, include the word דבר, most commonly translated as “word.” We see also that both include the word “wilderness מדבר.” Let’s investigate. First דבר:
For Bamidbar במדבר, also look at דם “measure” + בבר↔︎בור↔︎רוב↔︎רבב.
There is no בבר root. We’ll show the cognate permutations meaning below.
So Bamidbar במדבר, Numbers, could also be something like “the measure of positive/negative impact.”
And finally, we come to Devarim דברים. Before we go any farther on that, recall that according to strict reading of Scripture, the first four books, the ones just covered, were written by “the finger of God.” Devarim דברים Deuteronomy is the “retelling” by Moses. It may or may not be as revealing.
We already looked at דבר above. And we have previously looked at some different perspectives on “wilderness מדבר.”
One additional way to look at דברים is to consider the cognate permutation of ים, which is (strengthen/weaken). So, one could look at strengthen/weaken + דברcombine separate items into one (which, by the way, defines the entire process of שׂפה we look at here for the past year or so on the website:
❶ a root is a combination of separate letters with their own meaning into one
❷ nouns, which are what האדם was give authority to form by calling “names,” שמות, are formed by adding other items to the base of the root
❸ if you look at the way we have chosen to consider the meaning of the two-letter words, it is by looking at the different members of the Variant family and combining into one
❹ how Hirsch/Clark have derived a “cognate meaning” is to look at roots with homorganic consonants and combine their meanings into one (see several examples in the entries included)
❺ and finally, our cognate permutation work combines separate cognate meanings into one. Each combination gives a different response because other items are included. It is the Hebrew idea of what a proper king מלך should be:
And that, of course, goes back to Post 02. Multiple Witnesses, one of the most basic rules of life and of understanding God’s Word. And, I might add, is precisely what the Teacher is telling us in Matthew 7:1-5, log and speck – “consider differing views.” Funny, isn’t it, how all things tie together, because they are Truth – microcosm to macrocosm. When we look at others, we must remember that they have come from a different background. We don’t have to incorporate their stance into ours, but we are to “consider” and not judge. We are all God’s children, whom he loves.
So, what else can we learn from expanding the view a bit on דבר? One thing to do is to consider the phonetic cognates listed at the bottom of the דבר entry above and meditate on them, like דור being “generation.” How does our generation impact our thinking? Is it different from your grandparents’ generation? Is one “right” and one “wrong,” or simply different? And תור “search”, which is what the twelve tribal leaders were sent to Canaan to do, to “spy out” תור the land (see Numbers 13&14). They gathered their impressions and reported back, two of twelve having looked with a Godly perspective. And if we shift to cognate permutations, recall Blog 148. Hailstones, ברד, recalling our index verse, Isaiah 28:17, the hail sweeping away the refuge of lies. The cognate permutation meaning we derived was (expose/conceal). Combining separate items, considering differing views, strengthens our view of the world and draws us closer to a Godly perspective, even when we don’t agree. It is beneficial to perceive and recognize the other’s viewpoint.
So, a good way to think of Devarim דברים, putting all of these witnesses together, might be that the Wilderness experience exposed/concealed (mostly exposed) people’s strengths and weaknesses (leaders and followers alike) by the combining of many different events into one bigger picture.
This is just to be another background piece of looking at the language שׂפה, and how it works, as we hopefully move forward into Genesis 2. I, of course did not think of this on my own, but was led to it. Perhaps they teach this in shul at the kindergarten level. I apologize if readers knew this before and it has only just dawned on me. I only hope it helps some understand better how the language works. We have many aspects of Genesis 2 to explore. Hopefully, next time we return to that.
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