21st Century Bible Hebrew -- Genesis 4:25-26, qual binyan

Genesis 4:25-26

 

כה וַיֵּ֨דַע אָדָ֥ם עוֹד֙ אֶת־אִשְׁתּ֔וֹ וַתֵּ֣לֶד בֵּ֔ן וַתִּקְרָ֥א אֶת־שְׁמ֖וֹ שֵׁ֑ת כִּ֣י שָׁת־לִ֤י אֱלֹהִים֙ זֶ֣רַע אַחֵ֔ר תַּ֣חַת הֶ֔בֶל כִּ֥י הֲרָג֖וֹ קָֽיִן:

כו וּלְשֵׁ֤ת גַּם־הוּא֙ יֻֽלַּד־בֵּ֔ן וַיִּקְרָ֥א אֶת־שְׁמ֖וֹ אֱנ֑וֹשׁ אָ֣ז הוּחַ֔ל לִקְרֹ֖א בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְהוָֹֽה:

 

Translation:  Adam again knew his wife, she gave birth to a son, she named him Shet: “for Gd set for me other seed in place of Hevel,” for Qain had killed him.

To Shet, he, a son was born; he named him Enosh, then it was begun for the purpose of using the name of the Lord.

 

Vocabulary

הוּחַל

Was begun

 

Notice that l’shet  yulad, our consequential qual (in perfect aspect).  The consequences of this birth we will see shortly.  It’s agentless because Shet is not the one who gave birth, but we focus on him, not his wife, for reasons that Torah will go into shortly.

 

Notice the emphatic gam with hu; this is kind of like that structure I pointed out before where when a copula is understood, a nominative pronoun is used to set it off as the predicate.  This belongs here because the qual is quasi-predicate.

 

Huchal is hufal binyan.  In narratives, hufal seems to mean acting according to customary practice, so the last clause in verse 26 seems to describe a custom.  Rashi says that it meant that people forgot their ancestral traditions and began acting as if other things were gods than ****, the only real Gd. 

 

One of the neat things about nifal, pual, and hufal is how they go with legal systems.  In any culture that lasts long enough to develop a legal system, courts and so on, there are probably several generations of people.  These binyanim become important in a culture where the same legal methods are followed from generation to generation.  While there may be narrative examples of how the laws are applied, and they name individual people, they are basically reports on illustrative cases.  The agentless binyanim exist to show that the law doesn’t apply just to the people named as actors in the illustration; the law applies regardless of the names of the people who either judge cases or are tried for transgressions. 

 

Contrast this with the other binyanim which are used in the case reports or illustrative narratives.  I’ll show another reason for using them much later.

 

Notice that we have Adam’s third son here. This is another example of Olrik’s Law of Three, and the number three running throughout Tannakh. It’s also an example of how the youngest of three sons is the one that really matters, something you see in Greek myth (Kronos, Zeus) and in Grimms’ tales.

 

The audio for chapter 4 follows, also a link to the Hebrew text on the same site.

The audio:

http://www.mechon-mamre.org/mp3/t0104.mp3

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- Legend

Genesis 4:21-24

 

א וְשֵׁ֥ם אָחִ֖יו יוּבָ֑ל ה֣וּא הָיָ֔ה אֲבִ֕י כָּל־תֹּפֵ֥שׂ כִּנּ֖וֹר וְעוּגָֽב:

כב וְצִלָּ֣ה גַם־הִ֗וא יָֽלְדָה֙ אֶת־תּ֣וּבַל קַ֔יִן לֹטֵ֕שׁ כָּל־חֹרֵ֥שׁ נְח֖שֶׁת וּבַרְזֶ֑ל וַאֲח֥וֹת תּֽוּבַל־קַ֖יִן נַֽעֲמָֽה:

כג וַיֹּ֨אמֶר לֶ֜מֶךְ לְנָשָׁ֗יו עָדָ֤ה וְצִלָּה֙ שְׁמַ֣עַן קוֹלִ֔י נְשֵׁ֣י לֶ֔מֶךְ הַֽאֲזֵ֖נָּה אִמְרָתִ֑י כִּ֣י אִ֤ישׁ הָרַ֨גְתִּי֙ לְפִצְעִ֔י וְיֶ֖לֶד לְחַבֻּֽרָתִֽי:

כד כִּ֥י שִׁבְעָתַ֖יִם יֻֽקַּם־קָ֑יִן וְלֶ֖מֶךְ שִׁבְעִ֥ים וְשִׁבְעָֽה:

 

Translation: The name of his brother was Yuval; he was the father of all playing the harp and ugav.

Tsillah, she gave birth to Tuval Qain sharpening every tool of bronze and iron; the sister of Tuval Qain was Naamah.

Lemekh said to his wives “Adah and Tsillah, obey me, wives of Lemekh hearken to my saying; if I killed a man [was it] for my wounding? or a boy, for my injury?

If Qain is avenged shivataim; then Lemekh seventy seven.”

 

I said I would tell you what it meant that both the Qain episode and the Lemekh episode use yuqam.  Actually, it’s more than that, isn’t it? Lemekh knows the Qain story as an oral narrative among his people and quotes what Gd said to Qain.

 

The Lemekh episode is what Axel Olrik calls a legend. It’s short. It’s one episode. There’s only one important character; all that about his wives and children is partly a distinction between him and somebody else we’ll meet soon.

 

A legend ends with an exclamation that sums up the main character, or sums up the main issue of the episode. In this case it does both. It shows that Lemekh is presumptuous enough to think he’ll get away with his killing far longer than Qain did. This is an example of one of Axel Olrik’s principles called the Law of Ascent. Oral traditions often have repeated stories about an important issue, like killing. One of them will sometimes be more extreme than the other, like here, and that is what Olrik mean by “ascent”. Both the extremity and the walk through the generations show that the tradition places Lemekh after Qain, as does the technological advance of using iron.

 

This is one of two types of legend; it’s an anecdote. There are also origin legends, about the origin of a custom.  We don’t have that here. The idea that a killer is going to get away with it for what amounts to several centuries, is not part of the Jewish concept of fairness. That’s not why this anecdote is here.

 

Why it’s here is that people killing each other is not how society should work and that’s how the Qain and Lemekh stories relate. They also contrast with the next part of Torah, which is where we’ll find that word yoled I told you about.

Knitting -- cotton and linen

I've worked with a cotton-merino blend called Cotton Fleece (worsted) and Cotton Fine (fingering/DK). They work up well and there are enough colors that you can use them in Fair Isle work. They are hand wash/air dry and they wear very well. I have pairs of socks in this yarn that have lasted something like 15 years without needing the heels to be darned, and I have started throwing them in the dryer on "less dry" to get some of the water out of them before turning them inside out and hanging them on the clothesline.

But Cotton Fine is too heavy for summer. Comfy Fingering (cotton/acrylic) is not heavy, but it is warmer than you would think from the weight. It works very well if you are going to be in air conditioning. I made a lace stole in Comfy Fingering to throw around my shoulders on cool evenings when I've been wearing something both light and cool all day.

Linen is famous for being cool. You can spend $26 per 100 gram hank for sport weight Euroflax, or $5.49 per 50 gram skein for fingering/lace weight Lindy Chain. There may be others. As I said the other week, it takes 5 skeins of Lindy Chain to make a sleeveless summer tee that is both light and cool.

Linen needs special treatment and there are things about it that I've seen two opinions on.

1. If you buy linen that comes in hanks, you have to wind it to prevent kinks and knots. Use a cardboard tube or some other kind of holder and wind the hank onto it for a ball of yarn that will pull smoothly. More than one site says to do this twice to help soften the yarn. The other big issue with linen yarn is lint (the words are related) so do your winding outside or you'll have lint all over the house.

2. Use a slightly smaller needle to knit with. I've worked Euroflax on size 3 needles, instead of the size 4 I generally use for sport weight; I used size 1 with Lindy Chain.

3. DO A SWATCH. Then wash it and block it while it is still damp. Then you'll have an accurate estimate of stitch counts.

4. Before wearing your finished garment, wash it and wet-block it. Every time you wash a linen garment, it gets a little softer, but the color never fades.

5. Don't do ribbing: do seed stitch at edges or simply bind off. However, I have seen patterns that do put ribbing at the hem. I also saw one pattern that left the edges raw but I thought it looked unfinished.

6. Don't do steeking at armholes. If you are going to have sleeves, leave the edges of the armholes raw. Linen does not hackle, unlike woolen yarn, and steeking will unravel..

The real controversy is whether you can do stockinette in linen. One site says no, but another has a pattern done in stockinette. What's more, it's not just in linen yarn, it's in linen tape!

It's up to you, cotton or linen. Try a top in each and see which is more comfortable in hot weather!

21st Century Bible Hebew -- iron

Genesis 4:21-24

 

כא וְשֵׁ֥ם אָחִ֖יו יוּבָ֑ל ה֣וּא הָיָ֔ה אֲבִ֕י כָּל־תֹּפֵ֥שׂ כִּנּ֖וֹר וְעוּגָֽב:

כב וְצִלָּ֣ה גַם־הִ֗וא יָֽלְדָה֙ אֶת־תּ֣וּבַל קַ֔יִן לֹטֵ֕שׁ כָּל־חֹרֵ֥שׁ נְח֖שֶׁת וּבַרְזֶ֑ל וַאֲח֥וֹת תּֽוּבַל־קַ֖יִן נַֽעֲמָֽה:

כג וַיֹּ֨אמֶר לֶ֜מֶךְ לְנָשָׁ֗יו עָדָ֤ה וְצִלָּה֙ שְׁמַ֣עַן קוֹלִ֔י נְשֵׁ֣י לֶ֔מֶךְ הַֽאֲזֵ֖נָּה אִמְרָתִ֑י כִּ֣י אִ֤ישׁ הָרַ֨גְתִּי֙ לְפִצְעִ֔י וְיֶ֖לֶד לְחַבֻּֽרָתִֽי:

כד כִּ֥י שִׁבְעָתַ֖יִם יֻֽקַּם־קָ֑יִן וְלֶ֖מֶךְ שִׁבְעִ֥ים וְשִׁבְעָֽה:

 

Translation: The name of his brother was Yuval; he was the father of all playing the harp and ugav.

Tsillah, she gave birth to Tuval Qain sharpening every tool of bronze and iron; the sister of Tuval Qain was Naamah.

Lemekh said to his wives “Adah and Tsillah, obey me, wives of Lemekh hearken to my saying; if I killed a man [was it] for my wounding? or a boy, for my injury?

If Qain is avenged shivataim; then Lemekh seventy seven.”

 

Some of you no doubt think that the word “iron” has to be an anachronism because it places this part of Genesis in Hittite times. However, archaeologists have found meteoric iron that they can tell people were using, dating back to about 4000 BCE.

 

Smelted iron from the 2500s BCE is found in Anatolia.  This is right about the time that the Hittites came to Anatolia and possibly means they picked it up from the locals, who had been in place about 2500 years  at that point.

 

Carbon steel shows up in Hittite sites dating to the 1800s BCE.  This is right about the time the Hyksos took over in Egypt.

 

The urban legend is that Torah is the oral tradition of a Bronze Age people, but now you can see that for that to be true, the ancestors of the Jews would have to have existed before 2500 BCE.

 

Modern genetics shows that the homeland of the Semitic languages is not Mesopotamia. It is northeastern Anatolia, between Mt. Ararat and the Caucasus, between 5000 BCE and 3500 BCE.

 

I’m sure you wonder where all the broken iron went to that must have built up over the centuries until the so-called “Iron Age” actually began.  Without oiling and other kinds of care, iron rusts away to nothing.  The only reason families of knightly origin still have the swords of their ancestors, is that their ancestors knew how to take care of the steel.  It’s also true that it’s easier to melt down old metal and re-cast it, than to mine new ore and refine it. That’s why we recycle aluminum cans today. One of the characters in George Elliot’s book Romola is a professional collector of old iron for recycling, and that novel is set in the Renaissance.

 

This is one of many reasons that so little survives from past generations,  let alone past millennia. It’s an example of why an argument from silence in history or archaeology is a fallacy.

Knitting -- shaping lightweight yarns

Last week I posted a sleeveless summer blouse pattern. and I had you set a center back marker but I didn't tell you what to do about it. Here is where I tell you.

One of the problems with knitted tops is that the back hem can ride up or the back neck droop down.

In old patterns like the Bantam encyclopedia, the Spinnerin book I wrote about, or the patterns on freevintageknitting, they deal with this as if you were working with woven fabric. They have you knit decreases at the neck in front so that the center front is lower than the center back.

But in countries with centuries of knitting experience, they don't waste their time on that. They knit the back to be higher. And you can't even tell the extra stitches are there if it's done right. Here are the photos of the backs of the two summer blouses. One has this "mid-back elevation". Can you tell which one?

It's the green one on the left. See how the back of the neck goes straight across, while the back of the purple droops? A mid-back elevation is a great shaping for these lightweight tops, but it's also terrific with sweaters that you button up the front where a drooping neck looks awful.

You will find instructions for the mid-back elevation in most of the DROPS patterns at the garnstudio site. Here's how I worked it for the green Lindy Chain summer top. If you don't remember how to wrap stitches, see the video link on this post.

Row 80 will be a purl row. On the next knit row,
Knit 19 stitches past center back marker, turn, wrap yarn
Purl 39. Turn, wrap yarn
Knit 58, turn, wrap yarn
Purl 77. Turn, wrap yarn
Knit 96, turn, wrap yarn
Purl 114, turn, wrap yarn
Knit across.  Work the last 5 rows and then do the front.

You can do mid-back elevations in other yarn weights; do your math to figure out how to fit this onto those stitch counts.

You can also do a mid-back elevation on a top-down piece. The issue with those are, you have to work them lower down so that you have enough stitches to work over. Here's my stitch count, which I used with a sweater. For a fingering weight yarn, this goes where you have at least 75 stitches between the markers for the backs of the sleeves.

Purl 25 stitches, turn, wrap stitch

Knit 37 stitches, turn, wrap stitch
Purl 49 stitches, turn, wrap stitch
Knit 61 stitches, turn, wrap stitch
Purl 73 stitches, turn, wrap stitch.

The other issue in shaping a sweater is shoulders. If you're knitting for the 40 inch chest of a guy, his shoulders are probably so broad that the shoulders will sit easily. Us gals may be different: I know my shoulders are narrower than my bust and the neck doesn't fit closely unless I shape the front above the armholes. There are three ways to do this.

1.  Knit off extra stitches at the shoulders. For a Comfy Fingering sweater, this means 35 stitches instead of 30. If you were going to put pads in the shoulders (shades of Dynasty!), this might be a good choice.
2.  For a bottom-up sweater, decrease at the armholes like you do for the sleeveless top, once in 3 rows for 10 rows starting 30 rows above the armpits.
3.  For a top-down sweater, increase before the button or buttonhole placket every 5 rows for 10 rows. (You are already increasing at the sleeves.)

The following page has other shaping ideas, including darts to keep tops from riding up in front.
http://knitty.com/ISSUEdf11/FEATgreatfit.php

A number of the top patterns at freevintageknitting.com also have side shaping. They have you do decreases and increases at the underarm, for the most part. If you do this, make a commitment never to gain any weight. With a top made of woven fabric, you can use the size larger version of your pattern and make deeper seam allowances, then let the top out at the sides if you gain weight. With knitting, you're SOL; you will either have to lose the weight (yeah right I hear that) or make a new top.

Some shaping helps make the top fit or hang right. Darts and body shaping, I'm not interested in. I like my winter sweaters boxy for layering, and my summer tops boxy so they don't hold in the heat. YMMV.

Fact-Checking the Torah -- can you hear me now?

Wow. It’s been almost two years since I posted the start of my thread on Documentary Hypothesis, showing that it is mathematically improbable, factually and logically false.

For two years, nobody has responded to my critique of DH. There are lots of reasons for people not commenting on my posts.

·        People have been busy with their lives. When they have a spare moment, they can’t find information that would help them, that I didn’t already cover.

·        Or they already agreed with me, even if on different grounds.

·        Or the people who used to support it, have given up on it for whatever reason.

·        Or the right people haven’t seen the posts. If you know somebody and you think they could refute me, send them a link to the first post. Remember, I trashed DH from multiple angles, including mathematical probability and logic, as well as false facts and failures of Occam’s Razor.

I still occasionally go out on the web looking for new papers on DH. I found a 2016 paper (see first link) that had three takeaways for me.

First, DH continues to unravel. Ongoing studies are casting doubt on the history “in” D. Combined with the late 20^th century retreat from E, and Baden’s complete rejection of historicity (which undermines P), it means there’s not a lot left to DH.

Second, the paper comes to a conclusion, no doubt surprising to DH scholars, that Joshua reflects knowledge of Torah, which is not possible if the DH timeline is correct. Unless, of course, Joshua was invented after all of them including P. Which is not possible because Joshua uses pre-Captivity Biblical Hebrew grammar -- certainty epistemics, va-y’hi timing expressions, duplicate conditionals – as well as having examples of Olrik’s principles, the sign that it is an oral tradition.

Third, the author committed a mistake common to high-school writers. The conclusion has new material not predicted or supported by the body. It tees off on having to study for years to get accepted as an expert.  It was a startling mistake for somebody who had been publishing for at least 5 years, all the way back to a paper in a 2011 book called “The Death of Archaeological Theory”. The introduction to this book is in the second link.

Reviews of the book are instructive.

·        The title is a nod to a well-known interpretationist author. Bintliff's conclusion is clearly interpretationist.

·        Flannery and Marcus commit the redefinition fallacy by equating archaeology and anthropology – and denying that archaeology ever existed in the first place.

·        Kristiansen uses 20-year-old data without support and without citations. As a 60-year veteran in academic studies (as of 2011), he should have known better.

·        Gramsch shows how monolinguism has prevented European archaeologists from using work not written in their first language – something that also happens in the US – and therefore they lack a well-rounded understanding of events in the field.

It’s just another sad example of people in academe who create uproars at professional conferences (which they did) to get attention in their field, and why they have to create uproars.

This is not the caliber of work needed to rehabilitate DH, assuming that Bintliff and the others wanted to. None of them know that it needs rehabilitation. That’s where Graf/Baden isolationism has put DH: in Plato’s cave, looking at the light show without a clue of what’s going on outside.

http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1010-99192016000200005

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259922761_The_Death_of_Archaeological_Theory

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- Genesis 4:21-24, shivataim

Genesis 4:21-24

 

כא וְשֵׁ֥ם אָחִ֖יו יוּבָ֑ל ה֣וּא הָיָ֔ה אֲבִ֕י כָּל־תֹּפֵ֥שׂ כִּנּ֖וֹר וְעוּגָֽב:

כב וְצִלָּ֣ה גַם־הִ֗וא יָֽלְדָה֙ אֶת־תּ֣וּבַל קַ֔יִן לֹטֵ֕שׁ כָּל־חֹרֵ֥שׁ נְח֖שֶׁת וּבַרְזֶ֑ל וַאֲח֥וֹת תּֽוּבַל־קַ֖יִן נַֽעֲמָֽה:

כג וַיֹּ֨אמֶר לֶ֜מֶךְ לְנָשָׁ֗יו עָדָ֤ה וְצִלָּה֙ שְׁמַ֣עַן קוֹלִ֔י נְשֵׁ֣י לֶ֔מֶךְ הַֽאֲזֵ֖נָּה אִמְרָתִ֑י כִּ֣י אִ֤ישׁ הָרַ֨גְתִּי֙ לְפִצְעִ֔י וְיֶ֖לֶד לְחַבֻּֽרָתִֽי:

כד כִּ֥י שִׁבְעָתַ֖יִם יֻֽקַּם־קָ֑יִן וְלֶ֖מֶךְ שִׁבְעִ֥ים וְשִׁבְעָֽה:

 

Translation: The name of his brother was Yuval; he was the father of all playing the harp and ugav.

Tsillah, she gave birth to Tuval Qain sharpening every tool of bronze and iron; the sister of Tuval Qain was Naamah.

Lemekh said to his wives “Adah and Tsillah, obey me, wives of Lemekh hearken to my saying; if I killed a man [was it] for my wounding? or a boy, for my injury?

If Qain is avenged shivataim; then Lemekh seventy seven.”

 

Vocabulary

תֹּפֵשׂ	toucher
כִּנּוֹר	harp
לֹטֵשׁ	sharpener
חֹרֵשׁ	Tool
נְחשֶׁת	Bronze, copper
בַרְזֶל	iron
הַאֲזֵנָּה	Listen to
פִצְעִי	My wounding
חַבֻּרָתִי	My injury
יֻקַּם	Be avenged

 

Let’s get the grammar out of the way first. Yuqam is hufal, of course, as it was earlier.  Lemekh is saying that he personally should be legally defined as yuqam in the 77^th – what? 

 

Lemekh is the seventh generation of people in the world. This suggests that shivataim is seven pairs, that is seven pairs of parents or seven generations. So Lemekh should be avenged to the 77^th generation.  Why?  Qain is only supposed to be avenged if somebody kills him, and he’s still alive.

 

Or is he? Whom did Lemekh kill? What boy did he wound? Midrash Tanchuma Breshit 11 says that he was blind and his son Tuval Qain used to lead him around, put bow and arrow in his hand, and tell him where to aim. Up to this date, the arrows only found animals. Today, Lemekh killed Qain. When the boy told him what had happened, Lemekh killed the boy by accident.

 

Qain was sorry for what he did. Lemekh is not. Lemekh is presumptuous, thinking that 77 generations of descendants will follow him.  A blind man has no excuse for handling weapons, let alone letting a minor child, who cannot legally form intent, tell him where to aim. It’s a recipe for trouble.  Lemekh blinded himself to the possible consequences and thinks he’s going to get away with it just because Qain did.  How often have we heard that in the news?  Human nature hasn’t changed in thousands of years.