False interpretation of Isaiah

Discussion in 'Religion Archives' started by Medicine*Woman, May 3, 2004.

  1. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    Recently someone made a crack about my interpretation of Isaiah. I don't recall whom. The interpretation was not mine but was a Jewish interpretation. To set the record straight, or confuse Christians even more, I've c-a-p the following:

    Isaiah 62:5 in Eretz Yisrael Hebrew

    Ki-yiv'al bakhur betulah yiv'aluch bana'ich, u'msos khatan al kalah yasis ala'ich Elo'ha'ich

    Isaiah 7:14 La'chen, yiten Adonai (not YKVK) hu lachem ot, hineh ha'almah harah ve'yoledet ben, va'karat shemo immanuel.

    --- In Anti-missionary@yahoogroups.com, "Hugh Fogelman"
    <h.fogelman@v...> wrote:

    Daniel, thank you for showing me how my thoughts were wrong when I was trying to say Christianity was putting the wrong interpretation on Isaiah 62:4.

    Now I need another favor. I would like you to post verse 5, that
    is;

    I was told that verse Isaiah 62:4 reads as such; Isaiah 62:4 in
    Loshen Kodesh is, "Loi yeomer lok oid azoovoh >volartzek loi yeomer oid sh'momoh, kee lok yikore cheftzee >voh olartzek b'ooloh."

    bsoolah (putting the "S" in means a virgin)

    Continuing with this train of thought, I would like to see how the next verse reads, verse 5.

    Then finally, I need to see how Isaiah 7:14 reads when it talks
    about the young maiden, the "alma".

    I am trying to show that no way in heck Christians can interpret 2 completely different Hebrew words to mean the same thing. - I just need to show the complete Hebrew sentences in each of those verses to back up my thoughts.

    Hugh
    Visit the Truth-of-Judaism Web Site:
    http://www.jdstone.org/truth/
     
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  3. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    *************
    Further translation of Isaiah from Truth-of-Judaism Web Site:

    Virgin, depending on what Christians want to say
    By Hugh Fogelman

    If Christianity wants to quote from the Hebrew bible, they should know and understand Hebrew. For example, the Hebrew Tanakh says:

    Isaiah 7:14, "hineh (behold) ho-almoh (the young lady) horo (will concieve) vyoledet (and birth) ben (a son)"

    Their pulpit has told Christians that a young woman is a virgin. But not understanding Hebrew they make a grave error. Sexuality is not involved in its meaning when the Hebrew word "Almah" is used, because "almah" in Hebrew means a young woman. The "ha" in front of "almoh" means THE.

    Yet stubbornly, Christians will swear that the Hebrew "almah" in Isaiah 7:14 means 'virgin', as if Isaiah had no idea what he was writing about, and Christians do.

    Isaiah 7:14 KJV)
    14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

    Also notice, Christians changed "ha" (the) meaning present time, to "a", meaning future.

    Whereas, "Virgin" which in Hebrew is "Besulah", which specifically means that she has never had sexual relations - the Hebrew word besulah can never refer to a woman who has already had sexual relations. Ergo, the "besulah" was a 'virgin'. Christians still do not understand that "besulah" means virgin, and can never refer to a woman who has already had sexual relations.

    And if Isaiah in 7:14 wanted to mean virgin, he would have used besulah. But, he didn't. Why? He surely would have known the difference.

    Christianity, as usual, completely changed Hebrew words to mean something different from what the author intended. Christians made almah (young woman) to mean virgin, and besulah to also mean virgin.

    It is not that Christian translators didn't know the Hebrew word besulah meant virgin, they sure did know, because the Christian translators agreed that in:

    Isaiah 62:5 (KJV)
    5 For as a young man marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee: and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.

    The Hebrew for verse 5 is: Isaiah 62:5 In loshon kodesh, with english is this: ki-yival (as marries [that val part is from the same root as baal again]) bokoor (a bachelor) b'soolah (a virgin) yivolook (you will marry) bonoyik (your children) oomsois (and as makes happy) koson (a groom) al kaloh (with a bride) yosis (will make happy) olayik (with you) elokayik (your G-d).

    So, "Like a bachelor marries a virgin, you will marry your children. And as a groom is made happy by his bride, so your G-d will be made happy by you." In v. 5 we have the word "besulah" (notice the S), which means 'girl with hymen intact.'

    Christianity tries so hard to place Jesus in everything they read that they misinterpreted (purposely?) Hebrew Scriptures.

    In the Greek language, when they translated Isaiah, they had no word for the Hebrew "almah", and had to use another Greek word they thought came close enough - like the word "parthenos". But they shot themselves in the foot when they quote Genesis 34:3 in which, after the rape of Dinah, they still called her a "parthenos".

    Was Dinah still a "virgin" AFTER the rape?

    However, three centuries or so later, Matthew not fully understanding Hebrew read from the Greek Septuagint and decided that "parthenos" meant specifically a virgin. But this says nothing about the meaning of `almah'. And therefore, we have no reason to infer that Isaiah was speaking of a virgin. After all, all Hebrew Scriptures should be read in Hebrew, or a kosher English translation certified by a board of rabbis, not Greek.

    Nonetheless, Matthew (or the early church fathers forgers), stretching his (or their) imagination, used it to produce Jesus as being the child of a virgin birth.

    Remember, at the time of the early church fathers at the Council of Nicaea in 325, led by the ex-pagan Roman Emperor, Constantine, knew all about these pagan beliefs of "virgin births" from demigods, of which, Jesus fits the definition of a demigod to a "T".

    The church must hold this position of Matthew 1:22-23 mistranslating 'almah' in Isaiah 7:14 as "virgin." For nearly two millennia the church has insisted that the Hebrew word "almah" can only mean "virgin." Because, sarcastically, Matthew could never be wrong - he had the Spirit of the Holy Ghost in him. Yeah, sure, he must have had something in him to distort Hebrew Scriptures!

    Isn't it strange, that Christianity, when wanting to put their own "spin" on the Hebrew Bible will use a Hebrew word, right or wrong to suite their message one way, and in the same writings will again use the same Hebrew word to put their Jesus' "spin" on still another verse to fit their new message of Jesus. And if that doesn't work, they simply change the Hebrew word altogether to make it say something else.

    Christians forget Hebrew is referred to as Ha Leshon HaKodesh, meaning THE HOLY TONGUE, implying it was the language that God chose to compose the Torah.

    According to Strong's Concordance, the word "virgin" appears 16 times correctly in the Christian bibles when referring to the Hebrew word "besulah". So this clearly tells us that they know besulah means virgin in God's Holy Tongue.

    Some examples of "besulah" found in Strong's Concordance are:

    Exodus 22:17
    Judges 21:12
    2 Samuel 13:18
    Psalm 45:14
    Songs 1:3 & 6:6
    Isaiah 23:4
    Lamentations 1:4 & 18
    Amos 8:13

    Repeating, BUT when it came to Isaiah 7:14 - the Christian translators cleverly forgot that the Holy Tongue didn't mention besulah at all, knowing that the majority of Christians would never doubt their Christian pulpit.
     
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  5. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

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    Oops.
    Esaias 7:14
    Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; behold, a virgin [parthenos] shall conceive in the womb, and shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Emmanuel.​
    This is straight from the Septuagint, which is the Greek version that was in common use by both Jews and Christians at the time the gospels were written. In it, at least 70 (if tradition is correct) Jewish translators translated the word almah as "virgin" (as they did in Genesis 24:43; Exodus 2:8; Psalms 68:25 and Song of Solomon 1:3).
     
    Last edited: May 5, 2004
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  7. ConsequentAtheist Registered Senior Member

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    Recalling, of course, that you originally told us that the term Septuagint was the result of there being "70 books", you now manage to demonstrate further pervasive confusion. So, let's see:
    1. The tradition is baseless.
    2. The tradition applies solely to the Torah.
    3. The Greek version was not in common use among the observant Jews in Palestine at the time.
    4. As noted by Nahigian, "later Greek translations, by Aquila, Theodotion, Lucien and others, did not use the word parthenos.".
    5. The use of parthenos to refer to a young girl after being raped attests to its broad definition.
    6. The use of parthos in no way discounts the use of alma in both the proto-Masoretic and LXX vorlage.
    7. It is simply absurd to suggest that Ahaz was given as a sign something that would not occur until 700 years after his death.
    The truly honest and coherent discussion of the Virgin Birth is that found in the works of Paul and Mark.
     
  8. ConsequentAtheist Registered Senior Member

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    No comment, Jenyar?
     
  9. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

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    Patience, CA...

    But it was compiled and considered as authoritive as the Hebrew text, whether tradition accounts for it or not.
    As far as I know, only the Samaritans accepted only the Torah. As for the rest:
    "... but it is certain that the Law, the Prophets, and at least part of the other books, that is, the hagiographies, existed in Greek before the year 130 B.C., as appears from the prologue of Ecclesiasticus, which does not date later than that year."
    Catholic Encyclopedia
    "... it was finally received even by the Jews of Palestine, and was employed notably by Josephus, the Palestinian Jewish historian. We know also that the writers of the New Testament made use of it, borrowing from it most of their citations" [ibid]​
    Yes, later translations.
    "The Christians had recourse to it constantly in their controversies with the Jews, who soon recognized its imperfections, and finally rejected it in favour of the Hebrew text or of more literal translations (Aquila, Theodotion)." [ibid]​
    That's not the point. Throughout the Septuagint, the general word used to translate both 'almah' and 'bethulah' is parthenos. What we're concerned about is whether it was an appropriate translation of 'almah' in Isaiah, where it meant to emphasize a virgin or marriageable age (as opposed to one of say, 9 years old - in which case 'bethulah' would suffice).

    But "it is worth noting that outside the Bible, so far as may be ascertained, alma was never used of a married woman." [J.A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah]. The most conservative use of almah in the Bible is a young unmarried woman, and in all but two of them virginity is implied.

    Unless they were signs themselves:
    Isaiah 8:18
    Here am I, and the children the LORD has given me. We are signs and symbols in Israel from the LORD Almighty, who dwells on Mount Zion.​
    In this respect it's also interesting to note that according to the Babylonian Talmud (Sanhedrin 99a), Hillel (a contemporary of Christ) said "There will be no Messiah for Israel, because they already had him in the days of Hezekiah."

    And the last possibility must be stated. Christ wasn't born in accordance to the text, but to fulfill the text. That means his birth wasn't limited to semantics, and when Joseph and Mary gave birth without ever having intercourse, what was otherwise an obscure prophecy became that much more significant and meaningful.
     
    Last edited: May 6, 2004
  10. ConsequentAtheist Registered Senior Member

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    Of course. I have no doubt that, if given enough time and suitable prodding, you'll further embarrass yourself. Let's see

    The tradition related by you is baseless.

    Learn to read. The tradition concerning the 72 Rabbis applies only to the Torah.

    Who would have thought that Josephus, writing in Rome and under the auspices of Rome, would have used the LXX?

    Received by whom? According to whom? Verified how? Feel free to supply any evidence that it was accepted as authentic among the circles of Jewish religious leadership. In the meantime, let's loof at the evidence.
    The relative authority of the (proto) Masoretic text is self evident. Furthermore, where LXX is mentioned above, the author is referring to LXX-like (vorlage) texts in Hebrew and not your "accepted" Greek translation.

    How nice that you discovered the Catholic Encyclopedia, and thank both of you for acknowledging the Greek translation as an 'imperfection' that was later addressed. It almost makes up for your rather dishonest avoidance of a point already made: all known variants of Hebrew text employ the term almah.

    And you've offered nothing to suggest that it was an appropriate translation or that the intent was to emphasize anything whatsoever. On the contrary, you've offered as 'evidence' a quote that suggests employment of the term to be an "imperfection". On the other hand, the New English Translation Bible notes:
    ..., and this is your brain on drugs.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  11. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    I was just reading about this,

    94 Justin, Dialogue with Trypho 43.

    from "Beyond Belief The Secret Gospel of Thomas" by Elaine Pagels
     
  12. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    M*W: It is my understanding that this pregnancy referred to Isaiah's own son. It didn't mean his wife was a virgin, but apparently she was a young woman who had been sexually active with Isaiah.
     
  13. okinrus Registered Senior Member

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    It seems unlikely that Isaiah would write down such an account of the birth of his son because this would be viewed as only of private importance. Furthermore, viewing similar accounts in the Old Testament where a son is born to a prophet's wife, God would have been quite a bit more frank to Isaiah.
     
  14. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

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    Instead of pitting my sources against yours, I'll get straight to the issue. The authority of the interpretation is under question, not the authority of the Septuagint (in whatever form it was used).

    1. The prophecy applies to Ahaz, and might or might not refer to a virgin birth. The word is dependent on the context. The use of 'almah' does not exclude or enforce the possibility, which makes it a matter of interpretation.

    2. The verses that were quoted by the NT authors are from text that are contained in the Septuagint as we define it today, there's little doubt about that. If you don't think they had anything more than the Torah available to them, you must provide an alternative explanation for their use of it. But really, whether it was in formal use in Palestine is not an issue - what mattered was that those who received the gospel would understand its significance, and likely they spoke mostly Greek. We already have an idea what "Jewish religious leadership" thought about Jesus, and they probably encouraged the interpretation you prefer, instead of leaving it open to fulfilment by the Christians.

    3. The use of 'types' in prophecy should be familiar to you. Why answer a quote from Isaiah with the response that my brain is on drugs? What okinrus said is right, why write down a sign (if an ordinary birth could be called a sign of the magnitude Isaiah promised) for Ahaz if it didn't carry any meaning for later generations? After all, the Targum Jonathan says that Isaiah 9:5-6 is messianic, and it's parallel to the boy and "Immanuel" of Isaiah 8, what does that say about Isaiah 7:14? The "son" seems to grow in significance with each chapter!

    4. If there was no reason that they could extract a virgin birth from the text, they had to impose it from somewhere else. A real virgin birth would justify that application. But you would rather prefer that they imposed the notion from non-Jewish myths, wouldn't you? What Matthew said simply can't be true, can it?
     
  15. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    M*W: It's really quite simple. Isaiah was written in Hebrew which can only be translated correctly by those who speak, read and write Hebrew, not a translation of Hebrew into Greek or English. When it was translated from Hebrew, the Christians of course gave it the messianic slant. This discussion came about after a translation of Isaiah by a Hebrew speaking, reading and writing Rabbi.
     
  16. okinrus Registered Senior Member

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    Well, M*W, if Isaiah truly does express the words of God, as any prophet does, the concepts expressed within them are universal, for all peoples and tongues. Accordingly, Isaiah says that all of the nations of the world will gather and worship Yahweh and that the nations of the coastland will be drawn towards God. Isaiah does not say that all peoples would have to read Hebrew to understand what he says.

    The Christians did not translate the Hebrew into Greek but from the Septuagint. We most likely do not have the true Hebrew source material used by the Septuagint.

    In order to prove your point you must show that Almah was never at any time used to refer to a virgin.
     
  17. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    M*W: Alma was the translation of 'virgin' meaning 'young woman', not in any sense meaning a woman who had not had sexual intercourse. At that time, 'virgins' were of marriagable age from say ninewards on up. Pathetic as it seems, almas were simply young women who may or may not have had sex. Virginity refers to a young woman who has an intact hymen. An alma could be sexually active and of marriageable age.
     
  18. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

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    Song of Solomon 6:8
    Sixty queens there may be, and eighty concubines, and virgins ['almah] beyond number;​
    If queens and concubines already designate both married and unmarried women, then why specify "almah" as well? The only thing that would separate them from the other two would be their sexual state. The word would simply be redundant if that isn't what is implied.
     
  19. Medicine*Woman Jesus: Mythstory--Not History! Valued Senior Member

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    <*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*><*>
    M*W: No. You've taken this out of context. The only thing these women have in common is that they are all young. Sorry, Jenyar, this is the interpretation of a Rabbi who speaks, reads and writes Hebrew.
     
  20. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

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    Don't you think the rabbi's who translated the Septuagint from Hebrew could speak, read and write Hebrew?

    What in that passage indicates the queens and concubines were definitely young, even if that were the issue? The maidens were certainly young, yes, but they were also virgins - because if the king had slept with them, they would have been either queens or concubines, not so? Implying that these girls aren't virgins would hardly be flattering, which is what it is supposed to be in context, especially if they are young (i.e. not adults or widows). The same goes for the other instances in the Bible: if a young girl (almah') wasn't a virgin while she was unmarried, she was dishonoured, and the word could not be implied as a compliment.

    Perhaps a better example is this one:
    Gen.24:43
    See, I am standing beside this spring; if a maiden [almah] comes out to draw water and I say to her, "Please let me drink a little water from your jar," 44 and if she says to me, "Drink, and I'll draw water for your camels too," let her be the one the LORD has chosen for my master's son.'​
    This would hardly make any sense if she was already married, and even less sense if she was unmarried and not a virgin, especially considering Deut.22:21:
    "She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father's house. You must purge the evil from among you.".

    There is simply no instance in the Bible where 'almah' can mean a young woman who is not a virgin, even though the word itself might not specifically designate it.
     

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