Isaiah: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66
19:1 MAS'A MITSRAYIM HINEH YHVH ROCHEV AL AV KAL U VA MITSRAYIM VE NA'U ELIYLEY MITSRAYIM MI PANAV U LEVAV MITSRAYIM YIMAS BE KIRBO
מַשָּׂא מִצְרָיִם הִנֵּה יְהוָה רֹכֵב עַל עָב קַל וּבָא מִצְרַיִם וְנָעוּ אֱלִילֵי מִצְרַיִם מִפָּנָיו וּלְבַב מִצְרַיִם יִמַּס בְּקִרְבּוֹ
KJ (King James translation): The burden of Egypt. Behold, the LORD rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it.
BN (BibleNet translation): The pronouncement concerning Mitsrayim. Behold, YHVH rides upon a swift cloud, and is coming to Mitsrayim; and the idols of Mitsrayim shall be removed from his presence, and the heart of Mitsrayim shall melt within it.
The text now switches to Mitsrayim (Egypt), the deity's next target – which appears, alongside Mo-Av and Damasek (Damascus), to suggest that another significant change is taking place within the Isaiac text, worth exploring to see if the other Prophets follow the same line: previously Hebrewism, and today Judaism, were introspective cults, focused inwardly, opposed to proselytisation, making conversion a challenge in order to ensure that it was sincere; and with a clear separation between the Mosaic and the No'achic Codes, the expectations on Yisra-El and those on the Gentiles. But this is now a globalised cult, demanding the same "righteousness" of the Beney Mo-Av and the Aramim and Mitsrim, and threatening the same punishments. We can witness the same change in Islam from the Isra to the conquest of Mecca; Christianity, by contrast, started out as global.
AL AV KAL: Y-Y's constant word-games fascinate me. AV with an Aleph (אב) is "father", as in Av-Ram and Av-Raham, the dialect variants on the name of the Great Father before he was reduced to the status of a mere tribal sheikh. But the true Great Father (Ar Thor in Celtic, Jupiter in Latin...) is the deity of Creation, Brahma by yet another dialect variation, regarded as the Sun, and therefore, on certain weather-days, visible riding on the clouds. But isn't the Yehudit word for "cloud" ANAN (ענן)? Yes, it is. But generally that would be cumulus, and when it darkens into nimbus or nimbostratus, when rain is likely and tyhe sky is darkening, then Yehudit goes for AV, with an Ayin, as here. So the Aleph-Av rides on the Ayin-Av...
Though we should also remember that he is writing about Mitsrayim (Egypt), where the key tales of the sun-god Ra by day are the early versions of those of Phaeton and Helios in later Greece: the journey of the sun by day across the sky on an imaginary chariot (the Mesopotamian, No'ach and Utnapishtim, use a boat), and his return journey through the gates of the Am-Tuat, overnight, by boat.
And then see yet another play on the word AV at verse 3 - presumably the real reason for the word-play here.
ROCHEV: Comes before AL AV KAL in the verse, but needs to come after it in these notes, because it only becomes meaningful after the above note. ROCHEV is the Yehudit word for riding, specifically a horse or a chariot. But, again, we are in Mitsrayim, and every Beney Yisra-El will have known the "Song of Moses at Yam Suph", Exodus 15:1, its opening phrase, especially.
LEVAV: Yes, heart, but there is the LEV, which is the subjective-feeling heart, and there is the LEVAV, which is the objective-thinking heart, the one that we today misplace in the brain.
19:2 VE SICHSACHTI MITSRAYIM BE MITSRAYIM VE NILCHAMU ISH BE ACHAV VE ISH BE RE'EHU IR BE IR MAMLACHAH BE MAMLACHAH
וְסִכְסַכְתִּי מִצְרַיִם בְּמִצְרַיִם וְנִלְחֲמוּ אִישׁ בְּאָחִיו וְאִישׁ בְּרֵעֵהוּ עִיר בְּעִיר מַמְלָכָה בְּמַמְלָכָה
KJ: And I will set the Egyptians against the Egyptians: and they shall fight every one against his brother, and every one against his neighbour; city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.
BN: And I will spur Mitsrayim against Mitsrayim; and they shall fight, every one against his brother, and everyone against his neighbour; city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.
SICHSACHTI: After a while I find myself looking up the roots and etymologies of words, because I am assuming that Y-Y is playing word-games, and has chosen this one rather than any other deliberately. A word as poetical as SICHSACHTI even more so, because there is that level of his self-amusement too. But in fact the root is not SACH, and then he has doubled it to make this, though there is a root SACH, and it means "a thicket of trees", and it provides the word for temporary houses made from the branches of those trees, namely SUKOT, which just happens to be where Mosheh was, at Exodus 15, when he recited the "Song at Yam Suph". But this is not that. Or probably it is, but this is not only that ("my horse chestnut is going to choke your sapling oak, and then my conker will defeat your acorn": something punning of that sort). For there is a root SACHACH (סָכַךְ), and it doesn't really "spur" or "set against" at all: what it does is what growing nimbo-stratus clouds do to a sunny sky: it "overshadows" them, it "covers" them, it puts up a "screen" to obscure them (click here if you don't believe me, and then, while you are there, see where the verb is most often used: for the Mercy Seat: entirely deliberate these allusions and interconnections).
It occurs to me that MITSRAYIM is a multiple plural; what was the METSER? Answer at the link, and it is worth seeing in relation to what is happening in this oracle.
The method of achieving this, however, is not evangelism but war, here specifically civil war; the problem being…
19:3 VE NAVKAH RU'ACH MITSRAYIM BE KIRBO VA ATSATO AVALE'A VE DARSHU EL HA ELIYLIM VE EL HA ITIM VE EL HA OVOT VE EL HA YID'ONIM
וְנָבְקָה רוּחַ מִצְרַיִם בְּקִרְבּוֹ וַעֲצָתוֹ אֲבַלֵּעַ וְדָרְשׁוּ אֶל הָאֱלִילִים וְאֶל הָאִטִּים וְאֶל הָאֹבוֹת וְאֶל הַיִּדְּעֹנִים
KJ: And the spirit of Egypt shall fail in the midst thereof; and I will destroy the counsel thereof: and they shall seek to the idols, and to the charmers, and to them that have familiar spirits, and to the wizards.
BN: And the spirit of Mitsrayim shall be made empty within it; and I will render its counsel void; so they shall seek among the idols, and among the soothsayers, and among the mediums, and among the necromancers.
NAVKAH: Most scholars assume the root here is BAKAK (בָּקַק), but why would the Prophet drop that second Kuph, when the double-letter, and the doubling of letters and words, are amongst his favourite games for the articulation of his deepest ideas? And anyway, the meaning of BAKAK is ambiguous (see the link): it really means "luxuriant" (which is definitely not the intention here); and this is how it is used in Hosea 10:1. Y-Y uses it both with (24:1) and without (24:3) that second Kuph, and only two verses apart, which makes me even more certain that there must be two different roots, as with SACH and SACHACH in the previous verse. But what is the second root?
i) "Dust" in Yehudit is AVAK (אָבָק), and there are obvious games to play with this: ANI A'AVEK as "I will reduce... to dust" would work splendidly here (even conquering my conker!). But he doesn't, so it can't be that.
ii) Sefaria renders this as "Egypt shall be drained of spirit", for which see Gesenius' explanation of the etymology of BAKAK; but while you are there, take a look at his explanation of BAKBUK, which is the word for "a bottle". I am ready to hypothesise that one was an Egyptian word, borrowed into Yehudit, the other a Babylonian word, likewise borrowed, and the two became confused as one over time, the Babylonian BAKBUK getting its mouldy contents emptied, so to speak, over the luxuriant Egyptian. Though whether Y-Y was himself playing with this is difficult to know.
And then there are the fakirs, or should that, in Y-Y's reading, be spelled with an "e" rather than an "i"? Four different types though:
ELIYLIM: Are the idols themselves, carved figures of the deities, though how exactly they are distinguished from the Teraphim is not obvious: probably Teraphim was the description of the Ding-in-Sich, the actual artefact, where Eliylim described how they are regarded by those who idolise them.
ITIM: Homonyms and homophones. Aleph-Tet (אט) here, but there is also Ayin-Tav (עת), and see my notes on this word-play at verse 1. An ET with an Ayin-Tav is an "appointed time" (cf Genesis 1:14), which is any date designated by the deity for a feast, a fast or a festival, the three "pilgrim festivals" in particular, which of course include Sukot (this is a different link): so ITIM sounds like people who try to read the future by means of astrology, of which astronomer Y-Y heartily disapporves. But in fact it is not that. Here, ITIM comes with an Aleph and a Tet, which is understood to mean "gentle murmuring", but used specifically for the sort of gentle murmuring engaged in by mediums when they conduct seances and ventriloquise in the voice of the dead.
AVOT: Again see my note to AV at verse 1; the AVOT here are spelled the same as "fathers" there, and is in fact the word that becomes Abbot in English... no, I apologise, and withdraw that error with unreserved apologies. It is not AVOT at all. I read the text in its unpointed version, but now that I have checked the Masoretic, they have added for clarification a cholam chaser, a small dot above the Aleph, to indicate that this is OVOT, plural of the Ba'alat Ov who were prohibited at Leviticus 19:31, alongside, and how convenient for us, the next word in Y-Y's list, which is
YIDONIM: From the root YAD'A, which means "to know", but this is people who claim to know, but whose knowledge may be of an unverifiable nature. See also Leviticus 20:6 and 27.
But I need to point out, as I have done before, that this is really disingenuous, or do I mean hypocritical, because belief in any deity, including this one, is a superstition, and the Kepler argument applies to Prophets just as much as it does to necromancers. To paraphrase him, the situation is comparable with the distinction made today between a terrorist and a freedom fighter, that it is determined by whether you are their supporter or their opponent.
My speculation that the Guild of Yesh'a-Yah may have been the authors of The Book of Shemot (Exodus) does not come from verses like this one (the evidence is inside Exodus, but based on this book), but it is interesting to re-read some of Exodus, in the light of this conjecture: when Mosheh and Aharon arrived at Pharaoh's palace, upon the former's return from Midyan, they are carrying a divining stick and go into competition with the shamans of the court: Exodus 7:9 ff (verse 11 especially; and then see Numbers 17:23)
19:4 VE SIKARTI ET MITSRAYIM BE YAD ADONIM KASHEH U MELECH AZ YIMSHAL BAM NE'UM HA ADON YHVH TSEVA'OT
וְסִכַּרְתִּי אֶת מִצְרַיִם בְּיַד אֲדֹנִים קָשֶׁה וּמֶלֶךְ עַז יִמְשָׁל בָּם נְאֻם הָאָדוֹן יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת
KJ: And the Egyptians will I give over into the hand of a cruel lord; and a fierce king shall rule over them, saith the Lord, the LORD of hosts.
BN: And I will subdue the Mitsrim, in the hand of a cruel lord; and a fierce king shall rule over them, says YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens.
Egypt will be conquered and oppressed – which makes the text contradictory, for conquest is external but civil war is internal. There is also a problem with the notion of oppression; most of the Mosaic Code is written in the teeth of oppression, and self-consciously so, "because we were slaves in Egypt", and the social contract that Isaiah promulgates throughout cannot easily accommodate oppression amongst its virtues. The clash between the deity's uncontrolled anger, leading to vengeance in the most brutal manner, and his theoretical ethos of philanthropy, is never better demonstrated than here.
ADONIM: is actually plural, so why is it translated in the singular? To which the answer is: because it is not ADON, as in the deity, who will have "mastery" over them, but some autocratic overlord: same root, but an adjective rather than a noun, placed idiomatically in the plural. The description, of course, sums up life for the Habiru under the Pharaohs at the time of Mosheh.
Given what we know of Daniel (its being an analogy in the manner of Sartre's "Les Mouches"); is it possible that Isaiah actually wrote Exodus as an allegorical fiction? Even the language of the next verse(s) seems to hint at it.
One of the problems of this oracle is that Egypt was very rarely conquered during its history, though it often underwent civil war. The Macedonians under Alexander, and the Romans under Caesar, later on; but in the epoch of the Bible, the only significant conquest was by the Hyksos, and that is most likely the tale told through Yoseph in the latter part of the Book of Genesis, with the final defeat and expulsion of the Hyksos by Ach-Mousa told through the Mosheh and Yehoshu'a stories.
19:5 VE NISHTU MAYIM ME HA YAM VE NAHAR YECHERAV VE YAVESH
וְנִשְּׁתוּ מַיִם מֵהַיָּם וְנָהָר יֶחֱרַב וְיָבֵשׁ
KJ: And the waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and dried up.
BN: And the water in the sea shall dry up, and the rivers shall become parches and dry...
And after the conquest and the oppression, drought…
19:6 VE HE'EZNIYCHU NEHAROT DALELU VE CHARVU YE'OREY MATSOR KANEH VA SUPH KAMELU
וְהֶאֶזְנִיחוּ נְהָרוֹת דָּלְלוּ וְחָרְבוּ יְאֹרֵי מָצוֹר קָנֶה וָסוּף קָמֵלוּ
KJ: And they shall turn the rivers far away; and the brooks of defence shall be emptied and dried up: the reeds and flags shall wither.
BN: And the rivers shall turn into sewers, the streams of Mitsrayim shall become shrunken and nebulous; the reeds and rushes shall wither.
SUPH: Note that it is translated here, entirely correctly, as "reeds"; confirming that Yam Suph was never the Red Sea, which has a coral sea-bed and therefore cannot produce reeds, but the Nile Delta in Goshen, on the Mediterranean coast.
BN: And the rivers shall turn into sewers, the streams of Mitsrayim shall become shrunken and nebulous; the reeds and rushes shall wither.
SUPH: Note that it is translated here, entirely correctly, as "reeds"; confirming that Yam Suph was never the Red Sea, which has a coral sea-bed and therefore cannot produce reeds, but the Nile Delta in Goshen, on the Mediterranean coast.
19:7 AROT AL YE'OR AL PI YE'OR VE CHOL MIZR'A YE'OR YIYVASH NIDAPH VE EYNENU
עָרוֹת עַל יְאוֹר עַל פִּי יְאוֹר וְכֹל מִזְרַע יְאוֹר יִיבַשׁ נִדַּף וְאֵינֶנּוּ
KJ: The paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, and every thing sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away, and be no more.
BN: The mosses by the Nile, by the brink of the Nile, and all that is sown by the Nile, shall become dry, be driven away, and be no more.
…desertification… and endorsement of that confirmation
19:8 VE ANU HA DAYAGIM VE AVLU KOL MASHLIYCHEI VA YE'OR CHAKAH U PHORSEY MICHMORET AL PENEY MAYIM UMLALU
וְאָנוּ הַדַּיָּגִים וְאָבְלוּ כָּל מַשְׁלִיכֵי בַיְאוֹר חַכָּה וּפֹרְשֵׂי מִכְמֹרֶת עַל פְּנֵי מַיִם אֻמְלָלוּ
KJ: The fishers also shall mourn, and all they that cast angle into the brooks shall lament, and they that spread nets upon the waters shall languish.
BN: The fishermen too shall lament, and all those who cast their rods into the Nile shall mourn, and those who spread their nets on the waters shall suffer from famine.
What Y-Y does not tell us is how YHVH intends to achieve these things: by drought, by famine, by volcanic eruption, by disease, by sending an army, by magic? Or, rather, he does, but they do not interconnect: at one point it is an autocratic ruler who will conquer and enslave them, at another it is famine caused by drought. Autocratic rulers cannot cause droughts, though they can create the conditions from which the drought leads to famine. This, Y-Y, needs greater clarification!
19:9 U VOSHU OVDEY PHISHTIM SERIYKOT VE ORGIM CHORAI
וּבֹשׁוּ עֹבְדֵי פִשְׁתִּים שְׂרִיקוֹת וְאֹרְגִים חוֹרָי
KJ: Moreover they that work in fine flax, and they that weave networks, shall be confounded.
BN: Moreover those who work in combed flax, and those who weave cotton, shall be dejected.
…the failure of both the flax and the fabrics industries (i.e. economic collapse)… but how? boom and bust economics, leading to crash, which would be a result of human activity, or drought/flood, which would be a divine DAVAR?
BOSHU: The word is normally used to mean "ashamed", but self-evidently that is not the intention here. Judges 3:25 is closer to the intention here.
19:10 VE HAYU SHATOTEYHA MEDUKA'IM KOL OSEY SECHER AGMEY NAPHESH
וְהָיוּ שָׁתֹתֶיהָ מְדֻכָּאִים כָּל עֹשֵׂי שֶׂכֶר אַגְמֵי נָפֶשׁ
KJ: And they shall be broken in the purposes thereof, all that make sluices and ponds for fish.
BN: And those who were its foundations shall be crushed, every man who has a living to earn will grieve in his soul.
OSEH SECHER: I have no ides where KJ gets its "sluices and ponds" from. OSEH means "do" or "make", and SECHER are "wages"… this is about mass unemployment because the economy has collapsed.
19:11 ACH EVILIM SAREY TSO'AN CHACHMEY YO'ATSEY PHAR'OH ETSAH NIV'ARAH EYCH TOMRU EL PAR'OH BEN CHACHAMIM ANI BEN MALCHEY KEDEM
אַךְ אֱוִלִים שָׂרֵי צֹעַן חַכְמֵי יֹעֲצֵי פַרְעֹה עֵצָה נִבְעָרָה אֵיךְ תֹּאמְרוּ אֶל פַּרְעֹה בֶּן חֲכָמִים אֲנִי בֶּן מַלְכֵי קֶדֶם
KJ: Surely the princes of Zoan are fools, the counsel of the wise counsellors of Pharaoh is become brutish: how say ye unto Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?
BN: Are the princes of Tso'an not the most complete fools, the so-called wise men of Pharaoh abjectly incapable? How can you say to Pharaoh: "I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings"?
Presumably, based on this, "the foolish princes of Tso'an" were the ones whose serpent-rods got eaten up by Aharon's, and who then advised Pharaoh to pursue the Beney Yisra-El across the turned-back waters.
If by Tso'an a specific site is intended, can we assume, as Gesenius does, as Indiana Jones does, that it must have been Tanis - click here for the National Geographic article about it (you can look up the Indiana Jones for yourself), which is in the north-eastern corner of the Nile Delta, just before it reaches the Mediterranean: and it was once the capital of all Egypt, which adds another good reason for Y-Y mentioning it. Do we then have yet further confirmation that the Mosaic route out of Mitsrayim was along the northern Nile Delta and not through the southern Red Sea?
19:12 AYAM EPHO CHACHAMEYCHA VE YAGIYDU NA LACH VE YED'U MAH YA'ATS YHVH TSEVA'OT AL MITSRAYIM
19:12 AYAM EPHO CHACHAMEYCHA VE YAGIYDU NA LACH VE YED'U MAH YA'ATS YHVH TSEVA'OT AL MITSRAYIM
אַיָּם אֵפוֹא חֲכָמֶיךָ וְיַגִּידוּ נָא לָךְ וְיֵדְעוּ מַה יָּעַץ יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת עַל מִצְרָיִם
KJ: Where are they? where are thy wise men? and let them tell thee now, and let them know what the LORD of hosts hath purposed upon Egypt.
BN: Where are they, then, your wise men? And let them advise you now; and let them know what YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, has purposed concerning Mitsrayim.
19:13 NO'ALU SAREY TSO'AN NISH'U SAREY NOPH HIT'U ET MITSRAYIM PINAT SHEVATEYHA
19:13 NO'ALU SAREY TSO'AN NISH'U SAREY NOPH HIT'U ET MITSRAYIM PINAT SHEVATEYHA
נוֹאֲלוּ שָׂרֵי צֹעַן נִשְּׁאוּ שָׂרֵי נֹף הִתְעוּ אֶת מִצְרַיִם פִּנַּת שְׁבָטֶיהָ
BN: The princes of Tso'an have become fools, the princes of Noph are deceived; they have caused Egypt to go astray, they who should have been the pillars of her tribes.
Repeating verse 11.
NOPH: a Noph is usually a beach, which is actually quite strange in itself, because the root, NUPH, means "to wave" or "wobble", or sometimes, more strongly, to "agitate". Y-Y used it in 10:15 (MENIYPHO) for a man working energetically with a saw; and again (HENIYPH) in 11:15 for YHVH shaking his hand over the river in order to smite it; and he will use it again in 30:28 (HANAPHAH), when he will "sift the nations with the sieve of destruction"; there are dozens of other usages of the root, with similar meaning, throughout the Tanach. But there is also the Arabic NUPH, which means "an elevation", something like Geb in the Egyptian, and which appears in Psalm 48:3 (48:2 in some versions). But in the end I suspect that it is neither of these, and NOPH is simply a Yehudit mis-spelling of MOPH, the other royal city of Mitsrayim: Tso'an for Lower Egypt, until it was transferred to On (Heliopolis), Memphis for Upper Egypt.
PINAT SHEVATEYHA goes with HAYU SHATOTEYHA in verse 10, the one the "foundations" of the economy, the other the "pillars" of the community. But PINAH also has a secondary level with this allusion, because "EVEN MA'ASU HA BONIM HAYETAH LE ROSH PINAH at Psalm 118:22: "The [foundation] stone which the builders rejected has become the chief corner-stone [of the Temple in Yeru-Shala'im]". One of the best-known and most-often sung of all the Psalms, so nobody was going to miss that triumphalist allusion.
PINAT SHEVATEYHA goes with HAYU SHATOTEYHA in verse 10, the one the "foundations" of the economy, the other the "pillars" of the community. But PINAH also has a secondary level with this allusion, because "EVEN MA'ASU HA BONIM HAYETAH LE ROSH PINAH at Psalm 118:22: "The [foundation] stone which the builders rejected has become the chief corner-stone [of the Temple in Yeru-Shala'im]". One of the best-known and most-often sung of all the Psalms, so nobody was going to miss that triumphalist allusion.
19:14 YHVH MASACH BE KIRBAH RU'ACH IV'IM VE HIT'U ET MITSRAYIM BE CHOL MA'ASEHU KE HITA'OT SHIKOR BE KI'O
יְהוָה מָסַךְ בְּקִרְבָּהּ רוּחַ עִוְעִים וְהִתְעוּ אֶת מִצְרַיִם בְּכָל מַעֲשֵׂהוּ כְּהִתָּעוֹת שִׁכּוֹר בְּקִיאוֹ
KJ: The LORD hath mingled a perverse spirit in the midst thereof: and they have caused Egypt to err in every work thereof, as a drunken man staggereth in his vomit.
BN: YHVH has mixed within her a cocktail of dizzifiers; and they have caused Mitsrayim to stagger in every one of her works, like a drunken man staggering in his vomit.
So it is the deity's interference which is causing this. See my note at verse 9.
MASACH: A sense of "spiked drinks" - Proverbs 9:2 is my starting-point for that simile, though really I went there because I wanted to pick up the "pillars" once more (AMUDEYHA - עַמּוּדֶיהָ - there, which is even stronger than the PINAT, the next stage of building once you have put in the cornerstone), and see again the difference Y-Y is describing: theirs are collapsing, ours are leading us to Wisdom. Actually the whole of Proverbs 9 provides a paraphrase and commentary on this chapter in Y-Y.
19:15 VE LO YIHEYEH LE MITSRAYIM MA'ASEH ASHER YA'ASEH ROSH VE ZANAV KIPAH VE AGMON
וְלֹא יִהְיֶה לְמִצְרַיִם מַעֲשֶׂה אֲשֶׁר יַעֲשֶׂה רֹאשׁ וְזָנָב כִּפָּה וְאַגְמוֹן
KJ: Neither shall there be any work for Egypt, which the head or tail, branch or rush, may do.
BN: Neither shall there be for Mitsrayim any work, which head or tail, palm-branch or rush, may do.
This verse is a slightly varied repetition of 9:13 (9:14 in some translations): "VA YACHRET YHVH MI YISRA-EL ROSH VE ZANAV KIPAH VE AGMON YOM ECHAD - Therefore YHVH will cut Yisra-El off from head to tail, palm-branch and bulrush, on day one." See my note on ZANAV when you get to the link - it surely cannot be a coincidence in the light of the Mosheh-Aharon v "wise men" verses in this chapter.
And the repetition is interesting at another level too: it means that YHVH does not discriminate, one punishment for Yisra-El and a different one for the Goyim! Mind you, being a universal deity, being, that is to say, a metaphorical explanation of the workings of the Kosmos, how could there be differences?
KIPAH: This too has a note at 9:13.
19:16 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH MITSRAYIM KA NASHIM VE CHARAD U PACHAD MI PENEY TENUPHAT YAD YHVH TSEVA'OT ASHER HU MENIPH ALAV
KIPAH: This too has a note at 9:13.
19:16 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH MITSRAYIM KA NASHIM VE CHARAD U PACHAD MI PENEY TENUPHAT YAD YHVH TSEVA'OT ASHER HU MENIPH ALAV
בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיֶה מִצְרַיִם כַּנָּשִׁים וְחָרַד וּפָחַד מִפְּנֵי תְּנוּפַת יַד יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת אֲשֶׁר הוּא מֵנִיף עָלָיו
KJ: In that day shall Egypt be like unto women: and it shall be afraid and fear because of the shaking of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which he shaketh over it.
BN: On that day Mitsrayim will be like women; and it will tremble and fear because of the shaking of the hand of YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, which he will shake over it.
KA NASHIM: I think we have to take this, sadly, as misogynistic, that he sees Egypt reduced to weeping and grovelling, stripped of the macho spirit of the alpha male which is always heroic etc etc. Taken without the context of traditional patriarchal self-delusion, the words could just as well mean "the land will become fertile, intelligence will prevail, and the great womb-words, Mercy and Compassion, will become predominant." But I'm sorry to say that it doesn't mean that.
TENUPHAT: That root NUPH again; see verse 13.
19:17 VE HAYETAH ADMAT YEHUDAH LE MITSRAYIM LE CHAG'A KOL ASHER YAZKIR OTAH ELAV YIPHCHAD MI PENEI ATSAT YHVH TSEVA'OT ASHER HU YO'ETS ALAV
19:17 VE HAYETAH ADMAT YEHUDAH LE MITSRAYIM LE CHAG'A KOL ASHER YAZKIR OTAH ELAV YIPHCHAD MI PENEI ATSAT YHVH TSEVA'OT ASHER HU YO'ETS ALAV
וְהָיְתָה אַדְמַת יְהוּדָה לְמִצְרַיִם לְחָגָּא כֹּל אֲשֶׁר יַזְכִּיר אֹתָהּ אֵלָיו יִפְחָד מִפְּנֵי עֲצַת יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת אֲשֶׁר הוּא יוֹעֵץ עָלָיו
KJ: And the land of Judah shall be a terror unto Egypt, every one that maketh mention thereof shall be afraid in himself, because of the counsel of the LORD of hosts, which he hath determined against it.
BN: And the land of Yehudah shall become a cause of terror to Mitsrayim; just reminding people of its name shall induce deep fear, because of the intentions of YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, which he preparing against it. {S}
The methodology, as above, will be DAVAR, but the fulfillment of the covenant with YHVH, by Yisra-El, will bring it such rewards that the Mitsrim will only be abke to look up from their desolation in deep envy; so in effect the cause of all this is Yehudah, but it will only happen if Yehudah becomes that nation that believes and is righteous; which is to say, Y-Y is using theology as a weapon of propaganda against his own people, though the ostensible object of his oracle is someone else.
But this is now a post-mythological world, as per my commentaries in the opening chapters of this book. Propitiation is to be replaced by a Charter of Rights and Responsibilities. Where belief once brought fertility, now it brings something that we might call "messianic", though Y-Y would not have used the term. The argument is very simple (or would be, if he were making it to the Yehudim, rather than pronouncing against the Mitsrim): if Yehudah becomes righteous to the level that the deity requires, then the deity will act on Yisra-El's behalf to bring the rest of the world to the same state of righteousness, and they will honour Yehudah as the reason for their own ensuing wealth and comfort and peace and justice and general perfection as a society. So it becomes less a matter of "virtue per se" than of "vested interest" to be righteous. The same argument, of course, was used by Christianity during its imperialist phase, by Communism throughout the 20th century, and is used today by proponents of "Democracy" and "The American Dream", as it was of the "Land of Hope and Glory" that was the British Empire.
ADMAT YEHUDAH: Not Erets, definitely not Medinat, which is a modern idea. ADAMAH is the red earth from whose clay the first Human was modelled in Genesis 2 - see verse 5 especially.
CHAGA: Scholars have struggled with this word, because this is its only occurrence in this form, and because that Aleph ending suggests an Aramaic source, rather than Yehudit. Some versions of the text even change that Aleph to a Heh (חגה), and assume that the intention is some sort of a CHAG, which is a religious festival or pilgrimage, or even both (see Exodus 5:1 - we seem to be going back endlessly to Exodus 5 in this oracle, and it probably is not by chance or by coincidence! - and Leviticus 23:41): the inference then being that Egypt serves as the sacrifical beast. Alternately this is yet another of those double-letter words that Y-Y keeps on playing with, a CHAGAG (חגג) being a circle dance, the HORA in today's world; though of course dancing, and especially these circle dances, were a major element of the CHAGIM, as per Psalm 42:5, so perhaps the two are just dialect variations of the same word, and the scribe writing this down used the Aramaic, where Y-Y would have used the Hebrew (as I have just said Hebrew, where TheBibleNet would usually say Yehudit).
BUT: we must not forget that the deity has metaphorically spiked the drinks, and people are reeeling and staggering in their own vomit (verse 14). So now look at Psalm 107:27.
19:18 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYU CHAMESH ARIM BE ERETS MITSRAYIM MEDABROT SEPHAT KENA'AN VE NISHBA'OT LA YHVH TSEVA'OT IR HA HERES YE'AMER LE ECHAT
בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיוּ חָמֵשׁ עָרִים בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם מְדַבְּרוֹת שְׂפַת כְּנַעַן וְנִשְׁבָּעוֹת לַיהוָה צְבָאוֹת עִיר הַהֶרֶס יֵאָמֵר לְאֶחָת
KJ: In that day shall five cities in the land of Egypt speak the language of Canaan, and swear to the LORD of hosts; one shall be called, The city of destruction.
BN: In that day there shall be five cities in the land of Mitsrayim that speak the language of Kena'an, and swear to YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens; one shall be called the city of destruction.{S}
But it also confirms what we suspected when the Torah was written down by Mosheh, that Egypt spoke Egyptian and Canaan spoke Canaanite, and the two languages are fundamentally different, so what Mosheh would have written down would have been Egyptian hieroglyphs, not Hebrew print-or-cursive (even if Hebrew print-and-cursive yet existed, which they didn't, and wouldn't for at least another three hundred years!).
HERES: Should that not be CHERES(חרס), with a Chet rather than a Hey? Gesenius is particularly interesting on this: look up both roots in his Lexicon for the full account, but in brief: there are as many codices of this chapter which prefer CHERES as there are for HERES, so take your pick. If it is HERES, then it would mean "the destroyed city"; if it is CHERES, then it would mean "the preserved city". Again, take your pick.
There is also the a question: which city might it have been? Those who favour HERES, despite having no root to go by, believe it was the city known by the Mitsrim as IKEN, by the Greeks as Leontopolis. Those who favour CHERES recognise a link from the root to the idea of things being kept warm, or becoming warm (whence preserved"), and thence deduce IR HA SHEMESH, the "sun-city", which the Mitsrim called On, but the Greeks Heliopolis (see verse 13). And for a third time, take your pick.
19:19 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH MIZBE'ACH LA YHVH BETOCH ERETS MITSRAYIM U MATSEVAH ETSEL GEVULAH LA YHVH
בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיֶה מִזְבֵּחַ לַיהוָה בְּתוֹךְ אֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם וּמַצֵּבָה אֵצֶל גְּבוּלָהּ לַיהוָה
KJ: In that day shall there be an altar to the LORD in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar at the border thereof to the LORD.
BN: On that day shall there be an altar to YHVH in the midst of the land of Mitsrayim, and a pillar on its border to YHVH.
KJ: And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt: for they shall cry unto the LORD because of the oppressors, and he shall send them a saviour, and a great one, and he shall deliver them.
KJ: And the LORD shall be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians shall know the LORD in that day, and shall do sacrifice and oblation; yea, they shall vow a vow unto the LORD, and perform it.
BN: Then YHVH will make himself known in Mitsrayim, and the Mitsrim will know YHVH on that day; indeed, they shall worship with sacrifice and offering, and shall vow a vow unto YHVH, and shall perform it.
NADRU NEDER: The difference between a vow and a pledge lies precisely in the fulfilling of it. The word provides the opening ceremony of the fast of Yom Kippur, the ceremony of the annulment of all vows, KOL NIDRE.
19:22 VE NAGAPH YHVH ET MITSRAYIM NAGOPH VE RAPH'O VE SHAVU AD YHVH VE NE'TAR LAHEM U REPHA'AM
KJ: And the LORD shall smite Egypt: he shall smite and heal it: and they shall return even to the LORD, and he shall be intreated of them, and shall heal them.
KJ: In that day shall there be a highway out of Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians shall serve with the Assyrians.
KJ: In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land:
BN: On that day Yisra-El shall be the third party with Mitsrayim and Ashur, a blessing in the midst of the Earth;
KJ: Whom the LORD of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance.
MIZBE'ACH: see the link.
MATSEVAH: an altar and a pillar! The pillar is particularly interesting given that pillars in Yisra-El/Kena'an were generally either Asherim, which is to say sculpted ikons, or Ashterot, which is to say totem poles, or Tsi'unim, as in the one that David tore down when he conquered Yevus, all of them regarded as graven images by the Mosaic Code, and as such anathema.
But that only explains what, not why. I am inclined to look again at the tale of the the two-and-a-half tribes, in Joshua 22:10, though you will need to read the previous 9 verses, and then follow the episode through to its conclusion at verse 29, but even better keep going to verse 34, to understand both it and the relevance here. Verse 20 below seems to endorse this explanation, especially the word "ED".
19:20 VE HAYAH LE OT U LE ED LA YHVH TSEVA'OT BE ERETS MITSRAYIM KI YITS'AKU EL YHVH MIPNEI LOCHATSIM VE YISHLACH LAHEM MOSHI'A VA RAV VE HITSIYLAM
19:20 VE HAYAH LE OT U LE ED LA YHVH TSEVA'OT BE ERETS MITSRAYIM KI YITS'AKU EL YHVH MIPNEI LOCHATSIM VE YISHLACH LAHEM MOSHI'A VA RAV VE HITSIYLAM
וְהָיָה לְאוֹת וּלְעֵד לַיהוָה צְבָאוֹת בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם כִּי יִצְעֲקוּ אֶל יְהוָה מִפְּנֵי לֹחֲצִים וְיִשְׁלַח לָהֶם מוֹשִׁיעַ וָרָב וְהִצִּילָם
KJ: And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt: for they shall cry unto the LORD because of the oppressors, and he shall send them a saviour, and a great one, and he shall deliver them.
BN: And it shall be for a sign and for a witness to YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, in the land of Mitsrayim; for they shall cry out to YHVH because of those who are oppressing them, and he will send them a saviour, and a defender, who will deliver them.
The only obvious historical episode that this could be describing, as I have noted already, was the invasion and conquest of Mitsrayim by the Hyksos, which gets converted in later Yehudit folklore into the tale of Yoseph, and then the tale of Mosheh. My notes on this extend through the latter chapters of Genesis until the end of the Book of Joshua, so far too lengthy to repeat here, but it does sound, from these Y-Y chapters, as if he was perfectly aware that the Habiru, both Josephite and Jacobite, were Hyksos, and that the "saviour, and a defender, who will deliver them" was not Yehudit Mosheh, nor even Habiru Mosheh, but Egyptian Ach-Mousa.
19:21 VE NOD'A YHVH LE MITSRAYIM VE YAD'U MITSRAYIM ET YHVH BA YOM HA HU VE AVDU ZEVACH U MINCHAH VE NADRU NEDER LA YHVH VE SHILEMU
וְנוֹדַע יְהוָה לְמִצְרַיִם וְיָדְעוּ מִצְרַיִם אֶת יְהוָה בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא וְעָבְדוּ זֶבַח וּמִנְחָה וְנָדְרוּ נֵדֶר לַיהוָה וְשִׁלֵּמוּ
KJ: And the LORD shall be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians shall know the LORD in that day, and shall do sacrifice and oblation; yea, they shall vow a vow unto the LORD, and perform it.
BN: Then YHVH will make himself known in Mitsrayim, and the Mitsrim will know YHVH on that day; indeed, they shall worship with sacrifice and offering, and shall vow a vow unto YHVH, and shall perform it.
…Egypt will offer sacrifices to YHVH, which is odd, because "YHVH doesn't want your sacrifices" (1:13 actually calls them "futile sacrifices"). Nonetheless.
NADRU NEDER: The difference between a vow and a pledge lies precisely in the fulfilling of it. The word provides the opening ceremony of the fast of Yom Kippur, the ceremony of the annulment of all vows, KOL NIDRE.
19:22 VE NAGAPH YHVH ET MITSRAYIM NAGOPH VE RAPH'O VE SHAVU AD YHVH VE NE'TAR LAHEM U REPHA'AM
וְנָגַף יְהוָה אֶת מִצְרַיִם נָגֹף וְרָפוֹא וְשָׁבוּ עַד יְהוָה וְנֶעְתַּר לָהֶם וּרְפָאָם
KJ: And the LORD shall smite Egypt: he shall smite and heal it: and they shall return even to the LORD, and he shall be intreated of them, and shall heal them.
BN: Then YHVH will smite Mitsrayim, smiting and healing; and they shall return to YHVH, and he will be entreated by them, and will heal them. {S}
NAGAPH: Mosheh and Aharon with their serpent-staves, the Hyksos, the seven years of drought, the Josephite feudalism... we should by now be anticipating what comes next. The plagues, surely? See Exodus 7:27 (8:2 in the KJ), then 12:23, 32:35. So is this an "oracle" predicting repetition in the future, or is he reciting the "pronouncements" of the past, as a means of recounting history? If we go back through the preceding chapters, the same question over dating has come up again and again, and it never makes sense to call it predictions of the future, but always appears to be accounts of the past. Or should that latter be: theologically driven [re]interpretations of history?
19:23 BA YOM HA HU TIHEYEH MESILAH MI MITSRAYIM ASHURAH U VA ASHUR BE MITSRAYIM U MITSRAYIM BE ASHUR VE AVDU MITSRAYIM ET ASHUR
19:23 BA YOM HA HU TIHEYEH MESILAH MI MITSRAYIM ASHURAH U VA ASHUR BE MITSRAYIM U MITSRAYIM BE ASHUR VE AVDU MITSRAYIM ET ASHUR
בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא תִּהְיֶה מְסִלָּה מִמִּצְרַיִם אַשּׁוּרָה וּבָא אַשּׁוּר בְּמִצְרַיִם וּמִצְרַיִם בְּאַשּׁוּר וְעָבְדוּ מִצְרַיִם אֶת אַשּׁוּר
KJ: In that day shall there be a highway out of Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians shall serve with the Assyrians.
BN: On that day shall there be a highway out of Mistrayim to Ashur, and Ashur will come into Mitsrayim, and Mitsrayim will go to Ashur; and Mitsrayim will worship with Ashur. {S}
A great highway – a kind of Schengen Highway? – will unite Egypt, Assyria and Judah; which actually it already did, and had for many centuries; and not just one highway, but two major trading routes that joined Africa to Arabia and the East, both by way of Egypt. The paragraph below is from my novel about King David, "City Of Peace":
The Derech Ha Yam, the Highway of the Sea, which comes up from Lower Mitsrayim through the lands of the Bene Pelet; along the coast via Aza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Yafo and then inland through Aphek and along the Plain of Sharon, where it bifurcates; one route along the Valley of Yazar-El, and over the River Yarden into Ammon, and then on to Damasek and the great empire of Bav-El of the Bene Kessed beyond; the second fork continuing northwards through the Plain of Carm-El into the kingdoms of Tsur and Tsidon, into Aram and Ashur. Some of the most beautiful countryside in all the kingdom; some of the finest oases anywhere in the world. And the Derech Ha Melech, the King’s Highway, less beautiful but just as important, over the highlands of Gil-Yad, Ammon and Mo-Av, through the tribal lands of Menasheh and Gad and Re’u-Ven, all the way from Damasek in the north to Aqaba in the south by way of Ramot Gil-Yad, Gerasa, Rabat-Ammon, Dibbon, Sela...
AVDU: Here translated as worship, but why not as slavery: "Mitsrayim will be enslaved by Ashur"?
19:24 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH YISRA-EL SHELIYSHIYAH LE MITSRAYIM U LE ASHUR BERACHAH BE KEREV HA ARETS
19:24 BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH YISRA-EL SHELIYSHIYAH LE MITSRAYIM U LE ASHUR BERACHAH BE KEREV HA ARETS
בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיֶה יִשְׂרָאֵל שְׁלִישִׁיָּה לְמִצְרַיִם וּלְאַשּׁוּר בְּרָכָה בְּקֶרֶב הָאָרֶץ
KJ: In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land:
BN: On that day Yisra-El shall be the third party with Mitsrayim and Ashur, a blessing in the midst of the Earth;
BA YOM HA HU: I have waited for this last occasion of this phrase to make this observation, though probably I should have made it on the first occasion. No matter. Zechar-Yah, one of the great Prophets of the return from exile after 586 BCE, long after the very last of the Yesha-Yahs who make up this book. In the final chapter of his book, chapter 14, verse 9 to be precise, a line that must surely be a reference to Yesha-Yah, but which is the one that entered Jewish liturgy, and remains there till this day, the closing phrase indeed of every synagogue service, the closing lines of the Aleynu, and the unstated message to the Yehudim throughout this chapter of Yesha-Yah:
14:9 VE HAYAH YHVH LE MELECH AL KOL HA ARETS BA YOM HA HU YIHEYEH YHVH ECHAD U SHEMO ECHADבַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיֶה יְהוָה אֶחָד וּשְׁמוֹ אֶחָד
KJ: And the LORD shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one LORD, and his name one.
BN: Then YHVH shall be king over all the Earth. On that day YHVH shall be One, and his name shall be One.
Though that "One" was not yet the theology of Y-Y's day; he still followed the many, with YHVH simply as the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, as in the next verse.
19:25 ASHER BERCHO YHVH TSEVA'OT LEMOR BARUCH AMI MITSRAYIM U MA'ASEH YADAI ASHUR VE NACHALATI YISRA-EL
אֲשֶׁר בֵּרְכוֹ יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת לֵאמֹר בָּרוּךְ עַמִּי מִצְרַיִם וּמַעֲשֵׂה יָדַי אַשּׁוּר וְנַחֲלָתִי יִשְׂרָאֵל
KJ: Whom the LORD of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance.
BN: For YHVH, the Lord of the Hosts of the Heavens, will bless him, saying: "Blessed be Mitsrayim, my people, and Ashur, the work of my hands, and Yisra-El, my inheritance." {S}
AMI MITSRAYIM: Why is Egypt YHVH's people, but Yisra-El only his inheritance? See my commentaries on this throughout the Book of Exodus. Presumably because, as noted above, the "original" Mosheh was an Egyptian, and his taking the Habiru to Sinai to witness the volcanic eruption, and then to celebrate the covenant renewal ceremony, was an aspect of the Egyptian religion. Only when YHVH was taken in his Mishkan to Kena'an did he become the god of Yisra-El, and apparently he has missed his home in Egypt and is looking forward to this reunion as an opportunity for a nostalgic return.
But note that there is no mention of the Pelishtim in this new world order, and presumably all the other tribes, clans, cults, sects etc of Kena'an will also be absorbed (annexed?).
But note that there is no mention of the Pelishtim in this new world order, and presumably all the other tribes, clans, cults, sects etc of Kena'an will also be absorbed (annexed?).
Isaiah:
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30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55
56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66
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