Words of the Month (August 2022)

My words for this month are Hebrew and English.

1. Midrash (מִדְרָשׁ)-this Hebrew term occurs twice in the Tanakh, within the same book (2 Chronicles 13:22; 24:27). Its senses include exposition, exegesis, interpretation, and explanation: the ancient Jewish rabbis developed a form of literature known as the midrashim. In Judaism, the word can denote, "any of the rabbinical commentaries and explanatory notes on the Scriptures, written between the beginning of the Exile and c. a. d. 1200."

See https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/midrash

2. Syntagmatic-When structuralism deals with language, it proposes that language is a system wherein words internally relate to one another. According to this school of thought, words may be either paradigmatic or syntagmatic. The latter type of relation could be illustrated with the use of quart or pint and a liquid like milk or beer: "quart" and "pint" are the syntagma and "beer" is the word to which they bear a relation. Other examples are "Son/son" used in relation to God or "kingdom."

American Heritage Dictionary, Fifth Edition: [syntagmatic] adjective Of or relating to the relationship between linguistic units in a construction or sequence, as between the (n) and adjacent sounds in not, ant, and ton. The identity of a linguistic unit within a language is described by a combination of its syntagmatic and its paradigmatic relations.

Dictionary.com: adjective Linguistics.

pertaining to a relationship among linguistic elements that occur sequentially in the chain of speech or writing, as the relationship between the sun and is shining or the and sun in the sentence The sun is shining.

See also Anthony C. Thiselton, Hermeneutics: An Introduction.

Quotes from Genesis Rabba-Part 2

Man should look upon the birth of a daughter as a blessing from the Lord.--Gen. Rabba 26.

For seven days the Lord mourned (or deplored) the necessity of destroying His creatures by the deluge.--Gen. Rabba 27.

God will wipe away tears from off all faces (Isa. 25. 8). This means from the faces of non-Jews as well as Jews.--Gen. Rabba 26.

The sexes of both man and the lower animals were meant to be separated in the ark during the deluge. This is clear from the way in which they entered the ark: first Noah and his three sons went in, and then their wives separately (Gen. 7. 7). But when they came out of the ark after the flood, God commanded Noah, 'Go out of the ark, thou and thy wife, thy sons and their wives' (Gen. 8. 16), thus putting the sexes together again. Ham among the human beings, and the dog among the lower animals, disregarded this injunction and did not separate from the opposite sex in the ark. The dog received a certain punishment, and Ham became a black man; just as when a man has the audacity to coin the king's currency in the king's own palace his face is blackened as a punishment and his issue is declared counterfeit --Gen. Rabba 37-