H5027

• {"n":"Genesis 19:26","s":"His wife looked back from behind him. The verb is a deliberate, longing gaze, not a startled glance.","u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/bible-translation-differences\/#id=genesis-19-26","r":"Genesis 19:26","b":[{"l":"How modern translations read it","t":"Every version reads looked back, an accurate but broad English verb that does not distinguish a reflex from a deliberate gaze the way the underlying Hebrew word does."},{"l":"First, in plain English","t":"English **she looked back** covers everything from a half-second reflex glance to a long, wistful stare. Hebrew nabat leans hard toward the second: an intent, lingering look, closer to gazing after something you want than to a quick backward check."},{"l":"What you are seeing","t":"Nabat means to look intently, to regard with attention, sometimes with implied longing or favor, distinct from more neutral seeing-verbs elsewhere in the same episode, including the different verb the text uses when the two visiting men look down toward Sodom at 18:16, and again when Abraham himself looks toward Sodom the next morning at 19:28. The choice of nabat for Lot's wife signals a fixed, desiring look back at the life and city she was leaving, not a startled reflex any fleeing person might have had."},{"l":"Why translators split","t":"English looked back is neutral about intent; it fits both an accidental glance and a deliberate lingering gaze equally well, so the verse's implicit moral distinction, that this was chosen longing rather than reflex, requires knowing which Hebrew verb is actually being used."},{"l":"The rule to carry away","t":"When a narrative's moral weight depends on whether an action was deliberate or reflexive, check the specific verb Hebrew chose rather than assuming a general seeing-verb was neutral. Hebrew has multiple words for looking, and the choice among them often carries the judgment English has to state separately, if at all."},{"l":"Choosing between them","t":"Looked back as the basic sense is not in dispute among translators. The nuance, that nabat specifically implies a lingering, desiring look rather than a glance, is a matter of vocabulary precision that most English translations do not have the means to flag without an added phrase."},{"l":"The word","t":"\u05e0\u05b8\u05d1\u05b7\u05d8 nabat \u00b7 H5027"}],"src":["nabat as intent gazing, sometimes with longing or favor: standard Hebrew lexicons","The different verb, shaqaph, used for looking toward Sodom: Genesis 18:16 (the two visiting men look down toward the city), Genesis 19:28 (Abraham himself looks down the next morning)"]}