Parallelism in Hab. 3:12 LXX

Polycarp66 at aol.com Polycarp66 at aol.com
Sun Jan 30 14:20:51 EST 2000


In a message dated 1/28/2000 12:52:51 AM Central Daylight Time, 
c.s.bartholomew at worldnet.att.net writes:

<< In Hab 3:12 MT the two clauses appear to be parallel both syntactically 
 and semantically. By this I mean the parallelism is not just confined to
 formal elements but also appears at the level of meaning.
 
 (Note: The LXX in this verse differs from the MT at several points but
 that has little or no bearing on my question.)
 
 Hab 3:12 LXX (Rahlfs) reads:
 
 EN APEILHi OLIGWSEIS GHN
    KAI
 EN QUMWi KATAXEIS EQNH
 
 I have seen a recent private translation of Hab 3:12 LXX where EN
 APEILHi is rendered as the means by which the action of the verb is
 accomplished and EN QUMWi is rendered as the state in which the agent
 performs the action.
 
 EN APEILHi is rendered "by threatening"
 EN QUMWi is rendered "in anger"
 
 This rendering seems to negate the semantic parallelism. I suspect that
 lexical considerations were active in making this rendering.  APEILH is
 often found with the meaning "threat." However LEH (vol 2. page 46)
 suggests "anger" as the best gloss for this context. Also LEH cites
  Isa 54:9 as an example in the LXX where APEILH should be rendered
 "anger."
 
 I noticed that Charles Thomson in his now ancient translation of the LXX
 preserves the semantic parallelism:
 
  Charles Thomson's Rendering:
 
 EN APEILHi is rendered "with a threat"
 EN QUMWi is rendered "with wrath"
 
 I would like to suggest that both of these clauses use the EN + dative
 to describe the state of the agent and/or some quality of the action. I
 would render them with the ambiguous English preposition "in" which
 would allow the reader to decide on one of several semantic
 instantiations.
 
 EN APEILHi "in anger"
 EN QUMWi "in fury"
 
 I am not as concerned about how this parallel structure is glossed as I
 am with preserving the semantic level of the parallelism. If anyone can
 come up with arguments for abandoning the semantic level of the
 parallelism I would like to hear them.
  >>
I would suggest the following (I give translations of both the Hebrew and the 
Greek)

MT
In wrath you tread the earth.
In anger you crushed the nations.

LXX

With threats you humbled the earth.
With wrath you damned the nations.

gfsomsel



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