PSALLO

Jim West jwest at Highland.Net
Thu Sep 3 08:26:04 EDT 1998


At 11:56 PM 9/2/98 -0500, you wrote:


>a) What then is the word(s) for "sing & play" together?

psallw- because, orignially, psallw meant "to pluck or play a stringed
instrument".  Eventually, the plucking was accompanied by singing- thus the
word was used to describe both activities.

>
>b) There are plenty of references in the Old Testament that clearly 
>mentioning singing to the accompaniment of instruments.  What is the 
>Hebrew, and is it an exclusive word? 

Cf Ps 33:2-3 where singing and playing are coordinated by means of synthetic
parallelism.  The hebrew for v 3 is shiru lo shir hadash, hetivu nagen
bithru'ah.

This verse, frankly, is sufficient to put the lie to the notion that singing
must be a cappella.

> More importantly, how does the 
>Septuagint translate the original? 

Certainly NOT!  The LXX is not more important than the Hebrew text...  But,
regarding the translation of the LXX- for Ps 33:3 (32:3 LXX)-  asate autw
asma kainon kalws yalate en alalagmw.

> Are the words used for singing variants 
>of PSALLO? 

This is a bit unclear to me.  Do you mean are there cognates to psallw? or
do you mean are there synonymous terms?  The answer is yes.

> This is the question I really want answered!  If they are, then 
>it can easily be demonstrated that PSALLO is not an exclusive word and is 
>in fact much like our English word "sing" -- limited in meaning, but 
>applied broadly in its actual usage.
>

This is certainly a good summary of the facts as they exist.

>c) Does anyone have any other thoughts about the validity or folly of the 
>argument presented in general?
>

Well- that would plunge us into the miry depths of theological debate- and
I'm not gonna go there.....

>Anyone helping out would eventually receive a courtesy copy of the 
>manuscript as a means of saying thank you.

Not necessary.

>Erl Morrell-Stinson

Best,

Jim

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Jim West, ThD
Quartz Hill School of Theology
jwest at highland.net





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