UNDERSTANDING
THE BIBLE: translations
Exodus 14:30-31 וַיּוֹשַׁע
יְהוָה בַּיּוֹם הַהוא
These two
verses are said daily in the morning service as a separate prayer, immediately
before Moses’ Song of the Sea
(Exod.15:1-19).
I suspect,
however, both Hebrew readers and English translation readers pay little attention to the exact wording and its
subtle shifts.
Exodus 14: text based on https://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0214.htm. I have adjusted
the translation of LORD with the ETERNAL as per the original Hebrew’s intent.
This short
passage and prayer has a number of aspects that need highlighting:
Change in
verb number
Verse 30 and
verse 31 open using a singular verb when referring the Israelites: :
וַיַּרְא יִשְׂרָאֵל “and Israel saw”.
It refers to the people as a single nation or group
and therefore uses the singular for its verbs.
But then in
the second half of verse 31 it switches to plural verbs even though it relates to the same group.
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לא וַיַּרְא יִשְׂרָאֵל אֶת-הַיָּד הַגְּדֹלָה, אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה יְהוָה
בְּמִצְרַיִם, וַיִּירְאוּ הָעָם, אֶת-יְהוָה; וַיַּאֲמִינוּ, בַּיהוָה, וּבְמֹשֶׁה, עַבְדּוֹ.
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31 And Israel saw the great work which the
Eternal did upon the Egyptians, and the people feared
the Eternal; and they believed in the
Eternal, and in His servant Moses. {P} |
While the
Hebrew הָעָם normally means ‘nation’ or ‘group’ or ‘people’ as a collective singular noun, here it receives a
plural verb - וַיִּירְאוּ הָעָם “and the people (each) feared”. And
so too the rest of the sentence with וַיַּאֲמִינוּ – “and they believed”.
Why the change in mid- verse 31?
Collective to Individual
The change from collective
singular to individual plural is significant.
The salvation of the Israelites
from the pursuing Egyptian army was done to save the nation from genocidal
extinction as elaborated in Moses’s Song
of the Sea:
Exod.15:9
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ט אָמַר אוֹיֵב אֶרְדֹּף אַשִּׂיג, אֲחַלֵּק שָׁלָל; תִּמְלָאֵמוֹ נַפְשִׁי--
אָרִיק חַרְבִּי, תּוֹרִישֵׁמוֹ יָדִי. |
9 The
enemy said: 'I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil; my lust
shall be satisfied upon them; I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy
them.' |
After the Egyptians all drowned
-- while ever single Israelite was safe and alive -- the text switches to
plural verbs as it focuses on the individual reactions of each and every
person to this miraculous event.
Put simply, by switching to
plural verbs, the text highlights that every individual recognized his or her
personal salvation: as a gift from God, the Eternal.
Erev rav
When the text switches to plural
verbs, it also changes its subject from יִשְׂרָאֵל (i.e.,
Israelite nation) to הָעָם (i.e., the people).
This could simply be to add
diversity as the word יִשְׂרָאֵל had already been used twice in the same two verses.
But there is another possibility.
While the Israelites, the
children of Israel, had a long history of worshipping God, the Eternal, that
would not have been the case with the numerous ‘erev rav’: the non-Israelites
who also joined them in leaving Egypt -- either native pagan Egyptians or pagan
foreigners[i].
As such, the miracle at the Sea
of Reeds was a crucial moment in their conversion to Judaism.
It was a clear and visible
miracle where the God of the Israelites overcame the forces of mighty Egypt:
its semi-divine Pharaoh, his army and the gods they worshipped for protection.
It affirmed that the ‘reach’ and
intervening power of the Eternal, God of Israel, was not tied to any one
location or country: as was the general belief among ancient Egyptians.
The Eternal, God of Israel -- as
the sole ruler of the world -- could ‘act’ anywhere.
Consequently, the experience at
the Sea of Reeds was transformational to these new additions to the people of
Israel, and to their faith.
As for Moses
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לא ... וַיִּירְאוּ הָעָם, אֶת-יְהוָה;
וַיַּאֲמִינוּ, בַּיהוָה, וּבְמֹשֶׁה, עַבְדּוֹ. |
31 … and the people feared the Eternal; and they believed in the Eternal, and in His servant Moses. |
Verse 31 adds that not only did
the people now ‘trust’ in God, the Eternal, but also in Moses.
Why add the last piece re: Moses?
Because the miracle at the Sea of
Reeds -- and Moses key role -- reaffirmed to the people that Moses was truly their
divinely appointed leader.
When the Egyptian army was first
seen, the people were petrified at having to cross the water filled Sea of
Reeds, and some criticized and chastised Moses: blaming him for this crisis and
impending genocide -- as he was the one who triggering the Exodus.
Exod. Ch 14:11
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וַיֹּאמְרוּ, אֶל-מֹשֶׁה, הֲמִבְּלִי אֵין-קְבָרִים בְּמִצְרַיִם,
לְקַחְתָּנוּ לָמוּת בַּמִּדְבָּר: מַה-זֹּאת עָשִׂיתָ לָּנוּ,
לְהוֹצִיאָנוּ מִמִּצְרָיִם. |
11 And they said unto Moses: 'Because there
were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness?
wherefore hast thou dealt thus with us, to bring us forth out of Egypt? |
Moses’ key role at the Seab of Reeds and in their
salvation was proof of his role as God’s “servant’ and worthy leader.
After all, the waters only parted
to display dry ground when Moses lifted his hands, and the waters rushed down
to crush the Egyptians when Moses waved his hands again.
So, at the end of this miracle,
each person: Israelite and erev rav, affirmed
in his or her heart -- or maybe even verbally -- that the Eternal was their
protector and that Moses was truly His appointed leader of the people.
Feared vs Revered
-
וַיִּירְאוּ הָעָם “and the people feared”,
Philip Birnbaum, in his well-known
Ha-Siddur Ha-Shalem (1949) translated וַיִּירְאוּ
הָעָם as “and the people revered …”[ii],
The Art Scroll Stone edition, the
Chumash (1993), also used “revered”
in its English text (p. 375). But in its commentary, it notes that the Hebrew
literally means ‘to fear’.
So why alter the Scriptural text?
Because the Art Scroll follows Or
HaChaim’s interpretation that after seeing the Sea of Reeds miracle, the nation
rose to a higher level of faith: i.e., ‘revering’ God is a higher level that ‘fearing’
God.
[The Art Scroll siddur, The Complete Art Scroll Siddur first
published almost a decade before, however, used “the people feared’. It
noted this ‘fear’ was now of a higher level, but kept the Hebrew original in
its translation. Pocket edition, pp,
82-83.]
The RCA siddur, Siddur Avodat Halev (2018), also
translates “the people revered God”. But in its commentary to verse 31 (pp. 80-81),
the RCA explains the text really means “fear of God” and fear of His punishment
for violating His commandments.
It should be noted that these textual ‘adjustments’ are relatively new.
For over 2,000 years, ‘fear’ has been
the standard translation. Because it is
exactly what the Hebrew וַיִּירְאוּ means.
Ibn Ezra, ever the grammarian and
purist, long ago pointed this out in his first comment on verse 31, where he
cited as proof the example of 2 Samuel 6:9.[iii]
It has been the norm in Christian
bibles since Jerome did so, in his Latin Vulgate: the very first Christian
translation, 405 CE.
He translated the Torah scroll Hebrew
that he had access to as: timuitque
populus Dominum,[iv]
Timiut, from the verb Timere, only means ‘to fear’, and gives
us the modern English word ‘timid’.
The landmark 1611 English King James Bible and nearly all
Christian subsequent translations have followed Jerome and the simple meaning
of the Hebrew.
Though a very few, recent
Christian translations have switched to “awe” or “reverence”[v].
As for Jewish translations, the 3rd
century BCE Greek Septuagint used ‘to fear’ ἐφοβήθη .[vi]
Targum Onkelos (c. 110 CE) [vii] translated
it into Aramaic as וּדְחִילוּ
“ to be scared”.
The first Jewish English translation by the Jewish Publication Society
(JPS), 1917, concurred and translated וַיִּירְאוּ as 'they feared".[viii]
So too subsequent major
translations: the Soncino Chumah: the
five books of Moses with Haftoroth (1947) and the Hertz Chumash The Pentateuch and Haftorahs (1958).
Why it matters
Translations of ‘revered’ or
‘awe’ downplay the original Hebrew and its intent.
‘Revered’ or ‘awe’ instead of
‘feared’ makes the text sound more ‘positive’ and ‘respectful’, or, in the case
of the Art Scroll Chumash, fit an 18th century[ix]
rabbinic interpretation instead of the original Scriptures.
Doing so also ignores the long
establish axiom of Judaism as stated by King Solomon:
Proverbs 9:10
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Words matter.
It is the job of the translator to be as
faithful to the original text as possible.
Where a rare word appears or one
with multiple meanings, the translator should do his or her best to figure out
the appropriate ’idea’ from the context of the original.
But inserting ‘interpretations’ --
even from a revered Rabbi – or substituting more ‘pleasant’ and less ‘harsh’ words
is NOT the translator’s role and duty.
The Sea of Reeds miracle as the greatest of all
The 10 Plagues that befell Egypt
– one after another – over a year’s time gets enormous space and attention in
the Bible: Exodus ch. 7 through ch. 11.
The Sea of Reeds miracle only
gets one chapter, Exodus ch. 14.
But the Sea of Reeds miracle was
not accidental nor an afterthought in the punishment of Egypt, but rather a key
element.
Exod. 14
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ד וְחִזַּקְתִּי אֶת-לֵב-פַּרְעֹה, וְרָדַף אַחֲרֵיהֶם, וְאִכָּבְדָה
בְּפַרְעֹה וּבְכָל-חֵילוֹ, וְיָדְעוּ מִצְרַיִם כִּי-אֲנִי יְהוָה;
וַיַּעֲשׂוּ-כֵן. |
4 And I will harden Pharaoh's
heart, and he shall follow after them; and I will get Me honour upon Pharaoh,
and upon all his host; and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD.' And
they did so. |
To punish
Egypt for the pharaoh’s obstinacy in not letting the Children of Israel leave
Egypt was one thing, and, finally, after the 10th plague, the
Israelites were allowed to leave.
But as long
as Pharaoh had an army with over 600 chariots (Exod. 14: 7) to easily pursue
the Israelites, there would be no Exodus but a failed attempt at escape.
It was
therefore essential that Pharaoh’s chariot army be totally destroyed.
And so, the
miracle at the Sea of Reeds was not an ‘extra’ nor ‘accidental’, but the real crescendo
moment of the Exodus.
Maybe that
is why some of the great rabbis of the late 1st century and early
second century CE -- as cited in the Passover Haggadah-- saw the miracle at the Sea of Reds as far greater that
the 10 Plagues in Egypt.
Rabbi Yose
Hagelili argued that the Egyptian army endured 50 separate punishments at the
Sea of Reeds. He based this on taking the Bible text literally.
If one of
the plagues in Egypt is called “the finger of God” (Exod. 8:15) then, by
analogue, when Exodus 14:31 (above) describes the destruction of the Egyptian
army as “the hand of God”, simple math indicates a hand is 5 times as much as a
finger.
So 10
plagues in Egypt x 5 = 50 plagues at the Sea of Reeds.
Rabbi
Eliezer, however, argued that the Egyptian army suffered 200 separate
punishments.
Why?
He relies on
Psalms 78:49. The psalm reviews the plagues
in Egypt and -- after the plague of hail -- verse 49 states:
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מט יְשַׁלַּח-בָּם, חֲרוֹן
אַפּוֹ--עֶבְרָה וָזַעַם וְצָרָה; מִשְׁלַחַת, מַלְאֲכֵי רָעִים. |
49 He sent forth upon them the
fierceness of His anger, wrath, and indignation, and trouble, a sending of
messengers of evil. |
As Rabbi
Eliezer, notes, the verse repeats and repeats the punishment ‘idea’ and so he
believes each plague in Egypt had four sub-plagues. So in Egypt there
were 10 plagues x 4 = 40 plagues.
Consequently, by extrapolation, ‘the hand of God’ at the Sea would make
the math 40 x 5 = 200 plagues.
Rabbi Akiva,
using the same verse from Psalm 78, sees
five repetitions rather than four, and therefore argues each plague in
Egypt had 5 elements (= 10 x 5 = 50) and by the Sea, ’the hand of God’
inflicted 250 punishments.[x]
Put simply,
the above calculations show how leading rabbis of the post- Second Temple era
saw the Sea of Reeds miracle as truly major and essential to the success of the Exodus.
In closing,
whether one accepts the logic of these arguments and their mathematics or not: text
references to ‘a finger’ vs ‘a hand’, or relying on a poetic Psalm’s word repetition
-- composed at least 350 years after the Exodus -- as if it were in Exodus ch.
14, one cannot ignore that Rabbi Jose Hagelili, Rabbi Eliezer and the famous Rabbi Akiva all believed that the miracle(s) at the Sea of Reeds were the climax of the Exodus.
[i] On who was this ‘erev rav’,see https://www.thetorah.com/article/erev-rav-a-mixed-multitude-of-meanings.
There
is also a medieval commentary to verse 31 which states the verse refers to the
‘erev rav’ who only now fully believed in God the Eternal and his power.
[ii] See Birnbaum, pocket size
edition, p. 68 and 330.
[iv] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus%2014%3A29-31&version=VULGATE;NIV
[vi] https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/septuagint/chapter.asp?book=2&page=14 and see Strong, https://biblehub.com/greek/5399.htm
[viii]
See https://biblehub.com/exodus/14-30.htm This
JPS translation is used by Machon Mamre and many other Jewish texts.
[ix] Or HaChaim, Ḥayyim ben Moshe ibn Attar, born c. 1696 and
died 7 July 1743. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaim_ibn_Attar .
[x] https://www.sefaria.org/Pesach_Haggadah%2C_Magid%2C_Dayenu.1?lang=bi&with=Commentary&lang2=en
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