H1285

• {"n":"Genesis 15:18","s":"The LORD made a covenant with Abram. Literally, cut a covenant, and the chapter just showed you the cutting.","u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/bible-translation-differences\/#id=genesis-15-18","r":"Genesis 15:18","b":[{"l":"How modern translations read it","t":"Every version reads made a covenant, using English's own dead metaphor for finalizing an agreement, correctly conveying the sense but losing any connection to actual cutting."},{"l":"First, in plain English","t":"English **cut a deal** is a dead metaphor; nobody pictures an actual knife. Hebrew **cut a covenant** started out exactly that literal, and Genesis 15 is the one chapter where you get to watch the literal cutting happen right before the idiom is used."},{"l":"What you are seeing","t":"Karat berit, cut a covenant, is the standing Hebrew idiom for covenant-making throughout the Old Testament, and this chapter preserves the ritual behind the dead metaphor: animals are cut in half, and a smoking firepot and flaming torch, representing God, pass between the pieces, a self-maledictory oath in which walking between severed halves meant may I become like these animals if I break this covenant."},{"l":"Why translators split","t":"English cut a deal is used and heard purely figuratively, with no live memory of an actual cutting ceremony behind it. Hebrew karat berit sits closer to its literal origin, and this chapter is the rare place in the Bible where the idiom's backstory is narrated rather than merely assumed."},{"l":"The rule to carry away","t":"When you meet a fossilized idiom, cut a deal, cut a covenant, ask whether the Bible anywhere narrates the literal action the dead metaphor came from. Genesis 15 is exactly that kind of narration, and it is easy to read straight past it if you already think of covenant-making as an abstract legal event."},{"l":"Choosing between them","t":"Translators aren't actually divided here; made a covenant is the only workable English rendering. This note is meant to reconnect the abstract English phrase to the concrete ritual Genesis 15 actually describes just before the idiom is used."},{"l":"The word","t":"\u05db\u05b8\u05bc\u05e8\u05b7\u05ea \u05d1\u05b0\u05bc\u05e8\u05b4\u05d9\u05ea karat berit \u00b7 H3772 + H1285"}],"src":["The ritual of cutting animals and passing between the pieces: Genesis 15:9-17","karat berit as the standard covenant-making idiom throughout the Hebrew Bible: e.g. Genesis 21:27, 32; 26:28; 31:44"]}
• {"n":"berit","s":"Covenant. A binding arrangement, and in Hebrew you cut one rather than make one.","u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/bible-translation-differences\/#id=berit","r":"Genesis 15:18","b":[{"l":"How modern translations read it","t":"Every version reads covenant. Some render treaty or agreement in political contexts."},{"l":"First, in plain English","t":"**They struck a deal.** English keeps a physical verb in the idiom for making an agreement, and nobody is striking anything."},{"l":"What you are seeing","t":"Berit is a binding arrangement with obligations, sanctions and often a ceremony. Hebrew says to cut a covenant, which refers to the animals divided at Genesis 15. The ancient Near Eastern treaty form sits behind Deuteronomy's structure."},{"l":"Why translators split","t":"English covenant survives only as a legal or religious word, so the physical ceremony behind the idiom is invisible."},{"l":"The rule to carry away","t":"When the original uses an unexpected verb with a noun, the verb is usually a fossil of a practice."},{"l":"Choosing between them","t":"Covenant is universal in English versions; treaty appears in political contexts."},{"l":"The word","t":"\u05d1\u05b0\u05bc\u05e8\u05b4\u05d9\u05ea berit \u00b7 H1285"}],"src":["karat berit, to cut a covenant: Genesis 15:18; Jeremiah 34:18","The divided animals at Genesis 15:9-17","ANE treaty form behind Deuteronomy; see Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament"]}