H6440

• {"n":"Genesis 10:9","s":"A mighty hunter before the LORD. Renowned in God's sight, or in open defiance of Him.","u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/bible-translation-differences\/#id=genesis-10-9","r":"Genesis 10:9","b":[{"l":"How modern translations read it","t":"Most English versions read before the LORD without further comment, letting the ambiguity stand. The Septuagint's Greek, enantion, is the same neutral before-God's-presence wording used elsewhere for this construction; the harsher, defiant sense comes later, from rabbinic tradition rather than from the earliest translators."},{"l":"First, in plain English","t":"English **before** can mean **in front of, watched by**, as in a performance before an audience, or it can mean **in defiance of**, as in standing before a judge and refusing to yield. Hebrew's lifney carries the same double life, and this verse never tells you which one is meant."},{"l":"What you are seeing","t":"Lifney, literally to the face of, ordinarily means in the presence of or in the sight of, but can also carry a confrontational sense, standing in defiance to someone's face. Jewish tradition going back to early rabbinic sources reads Nimrod negatively, a tyrant hunting men rather than game and provoking God openly, while the plain sense of the Hebrew by itself supports the more neutral reading, a renowned figure whose fame was plain for all, including God, to see."},{"l":"Why translators split","t":"English before does carry both senses too, in front of an audience or in defiance of an authority, but English readers default to the neutral sense here because the surrounding phrase, mighty hunter, sounds like an honorific rather than an accusation, a bias the bare Hebrew preposition does not itself supply."},{"l":"The rule to carry away","t":"A small preposition can carry a genuinely double range, and later interpretive tradition, here the negative reading of Nimrod, can fill a gap the grammar itself leaves open rather than resolving it. Check whether a confident interpretation is coming from the Hebrew word or from a tradition built around it."},{"l":"Choosing between them","t":"Before the LORD, read neutrally, portrays a legendary figure whose renown God Himself would notice. The negative rabbinic tradition instead reads Nimrod as an early type of the tyrant who founded Babel two verses later, a reading the immediate context, his kingdom beginning at Babel, genuinely supports even though the preposition alone does not force it."},{"l":"The word","t":"\u05dc\u05b4\u05e4\u05b0\u05e0\u05b5\u05d9 lifney (\u05e4\u05b8\u05bc\u05e0\u05b4\u05d9\u05dd panim, face) \u00b7 H6440"}],"src":["Standard Septuagint text and translations (e.g. Brenton) render the phrase 'before the Lord,' the same neutral wording as the Hebrew, not 'against'","Rabbinic tradition (e.g. reflected in later midrash) reading Nimrod as a tyrant and rebel","Nimrod's kingdom beginning at Babel: Genesis 10:10"]}
• {"n":"panim","s":"Face, presence. Plural in form, and used of God constantly.","u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/bible-translation-differences\/#id=panim","r":"Exodus 33:14","b":[{"l":"How modern translations read it","t":"Versions read face, presence, or before according to the preposition it sits in."},{"l":"First, in plain English","t":"**Scissors.** **Trousers.** English has plural nouns for single objects and nobody notices. Hebrew does it with face."},{"l":"What you are seeing","t":"Panim is plural in form throughout. It means face, and by extension presence, and it forms a large family of prepositions: before, in front of, because of. My presence shall go with thee is my face."},{"l":"Why translators split","t":"English separates face and presence, so a request to see God's face reads differently from a request for his presence, when they are one noun."},{"l":"The rule to carry away","t":"Hebrew builds many of its prepositions out of body parts. Knowing the noun underneath explains the preposition."},{"l":"Choosing between them","t":"Face and presence are both majority renderings in their own contexts."},{"l":"The word","t":"\u05e4\u05b8\u05bc\u05e0\u05b4\u05d9\u05dd panim \u00b7 H6440"}],"src":["panim as presence: Exodus 33:14-15","the bread of the presence, literally bread of the face: Exodus 25:30","Numbers 6:25-26, the LORD make his face shine"]}