If you are fluent in Hebrew, this blog and discussion below may well strike you as unnecessary or at least odd, but it addresses a serious problem in translation when experts and the pious feel uncomfortable with the Hebrew text and its plain and obvious meaning.
The case in point is Exodus 1: 19.
Exodus Ch.1 is a turning point in the lives and
history of the children of Israel during their ‘sojourn’ in Egypt.
Due to the extraordinarily sever famine throughout the
Near East that Joseph predicted: a seven year famine, Joseph’s father, Jacob,
and his entire family relocated from
Canaan to northeast Egypt, the area of fertile grasslands called Goshen. The clan consisted of some 70 direct descendants
over 3 generations (Gen. 46: 7-26) with, in addition, their spouses (verse 6).
The migration included all their servants, all their belongings, animals and
herds (Gen.46:6)
The ‘temporary’ relocation lasted well beyond Jacob’s
lifetime and even that of Joseph the Viceroy and the entire generation of his
brothers (Exod. 1:1-7).
Then, as Exodus states in verse 8-10, a new ruler
arose “who did not know of Joseph”, and who greatly feared the large and
growing Israelite population in Egypt. Specifically, he feared they would aid
the ‘enemy’ if and when war would break out, and thereafter leave Egypt: with
all their belongings, wealth and abundant herds.
Who exactly was this ‘new ruler’ וַיָּקָם
מֶלֶךְ-חָדָשׁ – is still
debated as archaeologists, Egyptian historians and modern Bible Critics of the
Documentary Hypothesis[i]
disagree as to the very existence of a Moses, an Exodus, and its exact
chronology[ii].
I will comment and explore some interesting features
of the Bible text re: the new ruler, his fears and plots in a later blog, but
the focus here is on verse 19.
As the number of new Israelite births kept on rising
dispute the arduous burden of a new forced male labour tax (Exod. 1:12) – what
the French centuries later called corvee[iii],
and which King Solomon used for the building of the Temple[iv]
-- the new pharaoh orders the two Israelite midwives: Shiphrah and Puah to come to his palace (probably at Memphis[v]
which adjoins Goshen) and orders them to ‘ensure’ every newborn Israelite boy dies;
i.e., is stillborn for some ‘unknown medical reason’. Only the female newborns are to be allowed to
live(Exod. 1: 14-15).
However, the midwives did not do so for fear of God
(Exod.1:17) and when this news reached the new Pharaoh – from spies or others –
he ordered that they appear before him.
Their dialogue is brief and to the point.
The key part of their verse 19 answer is כִּי-חָיוֹת הֵנָּה
This has been translated for centuries in English
Christian Bibles as
“And the midwives said unto
Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian
women; for they are lively, and are delivered ere (before) the midwives
come in unto them.”
Or replacing lively
with vigorous.
The website, Bible Hub tracks some 25 Bible
translations[vi].
The 1611 landmark King James Bible used lively and so too eight 8 other subsequent
translations.
Vigorous is used by 12
others.
Rare alternatives are:
GNT:
“they give birth
easily, and their babies are born before either of us gets there."
GW: “They are so healthy that they have their babies before a midwife
arrives."
DB: “for they are strong, and
they have borne before the midwife comes to them.”
The standard Catholic Douay-Rheims uses:
“The
Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women: for they themselves are skillful in the
office of a midwife; and they are delivered before we come to them.”
This copies the 405 CE Latin Vulgate text exactly.
19 …
Non sunt Hebreae sicut aegyptiae
mulieres: ipsae enim obstetricandi habent scientiam, et priusquam veniamus ad
eas, pariunt.”
“The Hebrews are not like the Egyptian women; for
these have
knowledge of obstetrics and before we arrive they have given birth.”
[My translation.]
The ancient,
3rd century BCE Greek Septuagint translation is unusual as it
omits the middleכִּי-חָיוֹת הֵנָּה altogether, and adds an addition to the end to
fill out the verse length in its Greek Torah scroll:
Brenton
Septuagint Translation[vii] ;
“The Hebrew women are not as the women of Egypt, for they are
delivered before the midwives go in
to them. So they
bore children.”
As for Jewish translations, the landmark 1917 JPS simply
copied the King James using “lively”[viii],
and so too the 1947 Soncino Chumash and the 1958 Hertz Chumash.
In its 1965 update, the JPS used ‘vigorous’ as a
substitute for ‘lively’[ix].
The Art Scroll Stone Chumash (1993) broke away from
the above and translates as follows:
“Because the Hebrew women are unlike the Egyptian
women, for they
are experts; before the midwife comes to them, they have given
birth.
This matches the wording of Targum Onkelos (c.110 CE)[x]
and, as the Art Scroll always follows Rashi, ‘experts’ is Rashi’s own
preference as well. Rashi justifies this
by stating that the Hebrew word for midwives, מילדות, is in Aramaic חָיוֹת [but as the ancient Egyptians
did not speak Aramaic, this argument fails.]
Rashi, however, acknowledges
that the rabbis in Talmud Bavli, Sotah
11b[xi]
believed that the word חָיוֹת in
verse 19 means what it normally means in Hebrew -- wild
animals.
Rashi even quotes numerous
such animal comparisons from the Chumash as does the Talmud Bavli, Sotah 11b.
In fact,
the Talmud recognizes that any translation of חָיוֹת such as ‘lively’ or ‘vigorous’ or even
‘experts at obstetrics’ would not have been acceptable to the pharaoh as
he would certainly have followed up and asked:
“If
Hebrew women do not need midwives for they are able to handle birthing on their
own, why have trained mid-wives – as a profession – at all? (See Sotah
11b.)
I assume the rabbis of the Talmud also realized an answer
of “… they are wild animals” would also not have be acceptable: logically
speaking.
After all, the Pharaoh could similarly have even asked:
“If Hebrew women deliver newborns like wild
animals without any help, why have trained midwives at all?
One can
also wonder why the midwives chose the wording they did when they could as
easily have made their point by saying: ”They are (like) domestic animals = בהמות.”[xii] For domestic animals also normally give birth
without any human intervention.
And they could have said “They are like wild animals, i.e., כחָיוֹת (a simile) rather than
the text’s metaphor; i.e., they are = wild animals.
Put simply, the midwives had, in fact, four (4) choices to deliver the
same ‘idea’ and response:
The other options were:
a.
They are like domestic animals = כבﬣמות (simile)
b.
They are domestic
animals = בﬣמות (metaphor)
c.
They are like wild animals =כחיות (simile)
But they chose the
most outrageous and insulting phrasing:
כִּי-חָיוֹת הֵנָּה
“They are wild animals!”
Why?
I suggest that their ‘wild animals’ word choice was
the key to Pharaoh’s acceptance.
The reply of the midwives -- the choice of the extreme
label of ‘wild animals’ --was designed to appealed not to logic but to the
Pharaoh’s emotions and biases.
When someone is enraged as the Pharaoh had to be,
logical arguments do not work well. So
the ‘lie’ had to be made at an emotional level.
Facing execution for letting the
infant boys live and possible retaliation and death for their families who
probably knew the truth but did not report to Pharaoh, the midwives concocted
an answer that was not based on (fake) facts or logic, but rather one that
appealed on an emotional level;
one that tapped into the new Pharaoh’s biases and prejudices.
Concocted excuses that seem
logical can be checked; be they: Their mothers and sisters watched over my
shoulder every second, They went into premature labour while I was out of town,
They gave birth while shopping in the market and the boys – a 4th or
6th birth –simply popped out; A chariot and ox cart collision
blocked the road for hours so I was late.
The alternative the midwives decided
upon was to give an answer that was short and dramatic, and that would appeal
to the pharaoh at an emotional – gut –
level.
They chose the most outrageous and insulting phrasing: כִּי-חָיוֹת הֵנָּה
Consequently, a proper translation – one endorsed by
the rabbis of the Talmud -- amounts to the following:
Verse 18:
Pharaoh: Why did you not follow
my orders and kill the newborn males?
Verse 19:
Response of the midwives: Because unlike
Egyptian women, the Israelite women are wild animals; they give birth before
we arrive.”
And with that, the conversation ends in the Bible
text.
The new pharaoh does not execute the midwives for
failing to comply with his royal order, nor punishes them whatsoever. He
accepts their answer.
He buys into their grossly insulting, emotionally
packed ‘lie’.
(And then he goes on to another plot: ordering every
Egyptian to throw every infant Israelite boy they find into the Nile river:
as sacrifice to the river god (Exod. 1:22).)
In short, the midwives were shrewd in psychology.
Why inaccurate translations?
As stated at the outset, anyone familiar with Hebrew –
modern or biblical – even a child, knows
חיות means wild animals.
So too did the rabbis of the Talmud, Sotah 11b.
So why has every translation listed above – Jewish and
Christian -- from the 3rd
century BCE Greek Septuagint through Onkelos and into modern times refused to
be accurate?
Because, I suspect, to print a text that calls the
mothers of Israel, the holy women of God’s Chosen People ‘wild animals’ is
embarrassing and repugnant to the pious and faithful translator.
The rabbis of the Talmud had no such concerns and were
truthful.
I am sure they understood why the midwives said what
they said and how the new pharaoh would respond.
They too understood psychology and the power of emotions,
and were thankful the midwives’ rouse worked.
After all, Jewish tradition held the midwives were Moses’ mother and
sister[xiii].
And without their survival there would
have never been a Moses and Exodus as it unfolded in the Bible.
Final Note: Even
grammarians have ignored the obvious.
[i] See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
[ii]
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharaohs_in_the_Bible
[iii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corv%C3%A9e
[iv] 1 Kings 5:27-32
[v] See list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_historical_capitals_of_Egypt
[vi] https://biblehub.com/exodus/1-19.htm
[vii] https://biblehub.com/exodus/1-19.htm
[viii]
https://biblehub.com/exodus/1-19.htm
[ix] https://www.sefaria.org/Exodus.1.19?lang=bi&aliyot=0
[x] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkelos
[xi] https://www.sefaria.org/Sotah.11b?lang=bi
