Fulfilled Prophecy

yup, "and" (or in this case "but") is a vav-prefix. exciting, i know. one little letter. it's generally translated "and." unfortunately, prefixes aren't cataloged in concordances, so i can't give you statistics on that. so you'll have to trust me. it means "and."

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ok, just checking. yes, i know. i had the hebrew in front of me when i asked jar what translation he was using. it's clear from the context who nahum is talking to (well, it's clear to everyone here whose name isn't "buzsaw" anyways). but inserting it explicitly when it is not in the original isn't exactly ethical. no, obviously it does not. sorry buz, the hebrew says "and." you're hanging your point on a misreading of a vav-prefix? lol buz. lol. it's a vav-prefix, buz! this is elementary hebrew. bet-prefixes are "of." mem-prefixes are "from." vav-prefixes are "and." this isn't a matter of me convincing anyone of this. it's just another instance of you hanging some ridiculous misreading on forced vagueries and misrenderings of the text. yes, your interlinear text says "but." big deal, buz. it's commonly translated "but" when that particular translator wants to make a more abrupt transition. but the prefix means "and" and is simply a standard way of starting sentances in the bible. it starts the majority of sentances in the text, buz. that's how incredibly basic this point is.you wanna check a few translations of this? half the ones i have available leave off the "but" or "and." most of those have a "though" (which applies to the "but" later in the sentance). yes, buz. depending on the context. infering context from a vav-prefix is entirely backwards. are you really having this much trouble picture the charioteers of judah crashing throug the streets of nineveh, lighting everything in sight on fire? i can't tell if you have too much imagination or too little. read it again, buz. pre-babylon judah. dates BC count backwards. assyrian fell (as predicted by nahum) in 612 bc. 26 years LATER in 586 bc, judah was conquered by babylon. nahum is tlaking about the time between then -- he can't be talking about the solution to the babylonian captivity that hasn't happened yet, when the assyrian invasion is still going on. especially since all the text ever mentions is assyria.why is this so hard for you?Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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it's a fundamental misunderstanding of the prophets to think of them as "predictors of the future." they were religious leaders, and thinkers. they delivered messages and sermons to the people of judah and israel. they were the voice of god to the jewish people. most of what they said actually pertained to the present, and most of their predictions regarded near-future things. the coming babylonian exile, etc. often, their messages were thinly veiled rants or threats at foreign occupying powers, in an attempt to rally the nationalistic strength of their people. something that was, itself, entirely responsible for seeing the jewish people come back from babylonian captivity. without a prominent leader urging resistance and emphasizing hebrew identity, they would have been successfully integrated in the babylonian populace. ezekiel, for instance, didn't so much predict the return from exile as much as he actually made it happen.one of our earliest descriptions of a prophet is aaron. moses cannot speak to pharaoh, so god appoints aaron to speak for moses. god says that moses will be like a god to pharaoh, and aaron will be his prophet. so our earliest clear image of prophecy is of one man speaking for god.if it's not implied from that, deuteronomy spells out that moses is a prophet. joshua takes up his role -- joshua is a prophet too. did these mean predict the future? no, they spoke for god to israel, and lead israel through troubled times. that is what a prophet does.to think that "prophetic" means "predictive" is a product of another anachronism of colloquial usage. the hebrew word has no sense of predicting the future; only speaking.

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yes, exactly. they are nice simple verbs, which are hard to justify translating as anything other than present. the sense is definitally that they are general statement about god's power, from the context, and how the next argument follows from it: "don't f' with god."i'm just not entirely sure that every instance of present tense cannot be predictive, as style varies. for instance, see ezekiel 37, which predicts the restoration from babylonian exile (and spawned the famous "head bone connected to the neck bone" song). it's entirely in past tense, yet predicts a future event. the text describes a vision (which takes place in the past, of course) but the vision has symbolic meaning for the future (wrt ezekiel and co). the style demands past tense, yet it's still predictive prophecy.all i mean to say is that "style varies" and you should be able to tell from context. your analysis of nahum is spot on, and anyone reading it should be able to see that. it's fairly obvious. why buz doesn't get it, i don't know.

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yes.

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shachorah ani v'navah

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i am black and beautiful

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there's a fair chance that all of the "and"s are vav's. i'm not positive on the "but"s. there is a modern hebrew word that means "but," but i have yet to actually find it in the bible. the hebrew vav-prefix seems to just be a generic conjunction -- insisting on it meaning "but" and the using that "but" to imply a shift is somewhat contradictory to the purpose of the prefix, and really grasping at straws. so, about 94.6% of the time, at least. what is it with these distortionists that they take a word (or in this case, not even a word), and attempt to redefine it with an alternate translation that's used 3% of the time? if i had to gamble, i'd go with the 97%. wouldn't you?

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our argentinian neighbors say "che...." i don't think people write with "uhs" and other verbal pauses. it's an interesting idea, but it seems like a far more formal thing than that, and is definitally used to say "[this] AND [that]."

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none that i am aware of. i knew there's a modern word for it, but it's taken me a little time to track down a good searchable concordance to verify that it is indeed used in biblical hebrew.those words would be:

• ‘— - aval.

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  2Ch 19:2-3:

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  ...therefore is wrath upon thee from before the LORD. Nevertheless there are good things found in thee...

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• - ak.

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  Gen 9:3-4

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  Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things. But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.

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• - aken. (the opposite of - ken, "yes.")

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  Job 32:7-8

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  I said, Days should speak, and multitude of years should teach wisdom. But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.

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• — - ulam.

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  Gen 28:19

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  And he called the name of that place Bethel: but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.

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• - af

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  Lev 26:43-44:

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  ...they shall accept of the punishment of their iniquity: because, even because they despised my judgments, and because their soul abhorred my statutes. And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them: for I [am] the LORD their God.

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keep in mind that these are just the most likely ones. there are a few other words that could acceptably be translated "but," but i i have listed them, imho, in order of their probability of usage, as i understand it. the first two are commonly used in modern english. relatively few? they've got five common words up there for "but." this is bs. of course there's some subtle variations in wording dependent upon translation and best matching equivalents and context. everyone knows that, i hope. but you are attempting to make the bible a vague and flexible document, which you can then bend to your will. your argument is circular -- "green thought the context was this, so he rendered this word this way, so that tells me the context is this." wow, buz. wow. i am amazed at this observation.no one else here can believe you are hanging this point on a single letter, which you are forcibly misreading. in one of his translations, but not another? this is really convincing, buz. you're forcing a reading that simply is not present in (incredibly) elementary grammar of this one singular letter attached to a proper name. had this actually been as important a point as you seem to think it is, nahum could easily have used one of the choices above that does mean a contradiction.at best, you have a maybe. you're straining at gnats. you say tomato, i say tomato. i guess that doesn't sound as good written. if one wants to sell a contradictory conjunction, there are choices that actually represent this, and they are related to much different words. aval is related to the concept of mourning or lamenting. ak and aken come from negations of a positive. ulam comes from "perhaps." none of them are simple prefix connections that join one thing to another. in english "and" and "but" are used as similar conjunctions, but in hebrew they are not even close. the vav-prefix is a conjunction, and implies joining things together. it's totally the opposite. i don't think that's even the case. i think you are reading a sloppy translation, and i think your understanding of context and figures of speech in english is sloppy, BUT i think your interpretation is even sloppier.Edited by arachnophilia, : typo

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kind of. the differences are generally either very subtle (different cases, tenses, etc) or dramatic (something like homonyms, in which i suspect it's just coincidence). i am truly mystified at strong's concordance. it doesn't do what *i* would have done to catalog things at all. i've often seen one entry with multiple (distinct) meanings depending on context (homonyms), which i would have given separate entries. but then i run across multiple entries for the same word:just tonight, we were discussing genesis 18 in the chat, and why abraham addresses three people as one "lord." genesis 18:3 has an entry for "adonai" but genesis 19:2 has an entry for "adon" with the yud-possesive on it, rendering "my lords" with an s instead. they're both the same root word, with the same possesive. one or both are plural, but spelled exactly the same. why two entries for one word? do you have an example? i mean, a legitimate one, not buz. ironically, most of them are fairly similar.Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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hmm. i'm curious about conrete examples. i'll go looking...

buz. i didn't get out of the alef's. want me search the bet's? the gimmels? why would i need to try? the number of words in the english language, vs hebrew isn't exactly the point. you are attempting to distract from the fact that there are five better alternatives to the use of a vav-prefix to mean "but," if the emphasis is to be placed on contrast. there are five words up there that serve the same function. if nahum had wished to make the kind of contrast you seem to think he did, he would have used one of those words, not the vav-prefix. not "whatever reason." i told you the reason. starting every second sentance with "and" gets downright boring. in hebrew, it has a nice ring to it, a kind of alliteration. in english, it's dull. translators generally change the vav-prefix conjunction at the beginning of sentances to make the text more interesting to read.i've explained to you what the hebrew means. i've explained the grammatical connotations. i've explained the logic of the translation. i refuse to believe that you simply don't understand this -- you want to continue to misrepresent the text in every detail to support your failed interpretations. and to continue to hang this point a single letter that at best is rendered your way SIX PERCENT of the time? no one is convinced, buz. especially since most of that "six percent" are probably those five words above. it appears that way because you simply know nothing about translation or the hebrew language. waht's more, this has to be on purpose -- i gave you example verses, and they word they use to mean "but." and guess what? when the authors of the bible needed to start a sentance with "but" they had words for it. no, we can't move on at all. it is completely evident from this discussion that you do not read or interpret in good faith. what can we possibly hope to discuss with you if you cannot read a single letter of the bible correctly? what kind of debate is it, if you refuse to accept logic, and that maybe someone here knows a little more about translation than you? you don't want to debate. you don't want to discuss. because debating and discussing might force you to acknowledge that you didn't know something, or that you were wrong about something. no, you want to preach. and it's painfully obvious to everyone here.

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really, buz?then why are joshua, judges, samuel, and kings in the book of prophets?Nevi'im - Wikipedia that's great, but the prophets we're speaking of are hebrew, not greek. and in hebrew, "prophet" or ‘ navi comes from a word meaning, literally, "to bubble up," implying words rapidly coming from the mouths of the prophets. "prophet" means, literally, something like "spokesperson." not the point. the point is that they talked about stuff that actually concerned their audiences. and yes, a small portion of that was end-times stuff. but most of it had to do with stuff that actually affected the lives of those that heard the prophets speak. perhaps my pronouns and antecedants were unclear; that was precisely what i meant. the relationship we are given is:prophet:god::aaron:moses.if moses is like a god, aaron is like a prophet -- aaron speaks for moses. so a prophet is someone who speaks for god. there's the word: "spokesman." aaron spoke for moses, like a prophet speaks for god. that's the biblical definition of a prophet. one who speaks for god. can you read?

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In religion, a prophet (or prophetess) is a person who has directly encountered God, of whose intentions he or she can then speak as if a formal representative of God.

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Prophet - Wikipedia

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it's on the first sentance, and the definition. oh, look, it goes on:

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In popular usage, especially among Christians, a prophet is believed to be someone who can foretell the future. While religious texts do contain examples of this sort of prophecy, many of the messages attributed to prophets in religious texts, such as the Biblical prophets in the Hebrew Bible, claimed to speak for God and taught social or religious messages not necessarily accompanied by or dependent upon accurate prognostication.

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Prophet - Wikipedia

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really, buz. really.

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In Hebrew, the word traditionally translated as prophet is ‘ (nevi), which likely means "proclaimer". The meaning of nevi is perhaps described in Deuteronomy 18:18, where God said, "I will put my words in his mouth and he will speak to them all that I command him." Thus, the navi was thought to be the "mouth" of God. The root nun-bet-alef ("navi") is based on the two-letter root nun-bet which denotes hollowness or openness; to receive transcendental wisdom, one must make oneself “open”. Cf. Rashbam's comment to Genesis 20:7.

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According to I Samuel 9:9, the old name for navi is ro'eh, , which literally means "Seer". That could document an ancient shift, from viewing prophets as seers for hire to viewing them as moral teachers. Allen (1971) comments that in the First Temple Era, there were essentially seer-priests, who formed a guild, divined, performed rituals and sacrifices, and were scribes, and then there were canonical prophets, who did none of these (and were against divination) and had instead a message to deliver. The seer-priests were usually attached to a local shrine or temple, such as Shiloh, and initiated others as priests in that priesthood: it was a mystical craft-guild with apprentices and recruitment. Canonical prophets were not organised this way. The similar term "ben-navi" ("son of the prophet") means "member of a seer-priest guild".

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Some examples of prophets in the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) include Abraham, Sarah, Isaiah, Samuel, Ezekiel, Malachi, and Job. In Jewish tradition, Daniel is not counted in the list of prophets.

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Prophet - Wikipedia

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are we done yet?Edited by arachnophilia, : typo

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good.vav is a conjunction that joins things. sorry buz, you lose. thank you for playing.

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it's not obfuscation simply because you fail to understand it. this tells me there is something greviously wrong with the logic of your argument. you seem to be working from two presuppositions: "the text has to use a prefix" and "the text means but."you are, essentially, putting the cart before the horse. we start the original, when we translate. not the translation -- the translation is the final result. and we certainly do not start with the interpretation. that comes after we know what the text says. i gave you five examples of how the authors would emphasize difference with a "but" in the text. if they authors wanted to say "but" they would have used one of those words. there is no prefix for "but" -- why would it have to be a prefix, buz? because there's a vav-prefix in the text?that prefix means "and." you are assuming a reason. i gave you another. so at best you have a "possible." great argument. clearly, your contextual reading if very flawed. i doubt that one simple word indicates that knowledgeable translators read as badly as you do. let's look at why, shall we?

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(Old JPS)

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8 And the queen is uncovered, she is carried away, and her handmaids moan as with the voice of doves, tabering upon their breasts.

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9 But Nineveh hath been from of old like a pool of water; yet they flee away; 'Stand, stand'; but none looketh back.

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"the queen is carried away, but the city does nothing."contrary to your logic, "but" (in english) is a conjunction, and it connects things. this "but" connects it to the earlier sentance. nineveh does nothing while her queen is carried away. it does not point to a major transition in the text, just a contrast in the sentance. because that contrast is implied in the hebrew, "but" is an acceptable english translation. but it really says "and."context does not agree with you here. "though" is not the same word as "but." it changes around the dependent and independent clause.

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(NKJV)

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Though Nineveh of old was like a pool of water,
Now they flee away.
"Halt! Halt!" they cry;
But no one turns back.

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there's the contrast -- nineveh used to be calm, now it is not. neither of these plausible interpretations of the grammar support your implausible position that the preceeding verses are not about nineveh. in fact, your chosen translation, "but," actually contradicts your view, because it indicates that the prior sentance has to be about nineveh. this is reading comprenehsion 101, buz. it's not "my viewpoint." it's what the text says.Edited by arachnophilia, : typos

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in fact, buz, i do.

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