Douay Rheims issues

[Nooj]

Well I thought that was an etiological explanation for why snakes and humans have an antagonistic relationship. We kill snakes all the time and vice versa.

I never saw a Christological prophecy in there, though I suppose that’s possible too. That brings its own problems though because people interpret the snake as Satan, and there’s no evidence in Genesis or the Hebrew Bible for Satan being the implacable enemy of mankind as he is in the NT. Seems anachronistic for me.

 

[DaveBj]

Well I thought that was an etiological explanation for why snakes and humans have an antagonistic relationship. We kill snakes all the time and vice versa.

I never saw a Christological prophecy in there, though I suppose that’s possible too. That brings its own problems though because people interpret the snake as Satan, and there’s no evidence in Genesis or the Hebrew Bible for Satan being the implacable enemy of mankind as he is in the NT. Seems anachronistic for me.

Except for Genesis and the book of Job (where Satan is not exactly Job’s friend), you are right; there’s little evidence of Satan’s existence at all. I heard a Word of Faith preacher once say that was because people weren’t prepared to deal with him yet, what with not having the Name of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit. His interp, not mine.

I recently read a sci-fi/fantasy book in which the archangels were main characters, and the character of Satan (named Morningstar) had an interesting take on humans: “Mortals have never been an interest of mine, honestly. To me, they were just God’s mud dolls animated by His holy breath for some sick experiment in free will. I normally let them play in their dirt and filth without a second thought.” That seems to echo the OT’s depiction of the relationship between Satan and humans.

DaveBj

 

[Dave_Noonan]

I don’t know Hebrew, Dave but from a little searching around, it seems to me that this is not really an error but just a Hebraism. Apparently Greek and Latin translators used a variety of ways to translate the infinitive absolute construction, and using a noun was one of these. See this chapter.

The Greek translates the verse in much the same way as the Latin: θανάτῳ ἀποθανεῖσθε. It’s hard to believe that both sets of translators were so bad with Hebrew that they made the same kind of mistake.

Incidentally, for some reason, Hebrew and Arabic remain deeply unattractive to me. I find myself interested in Akkadian instead. Must be the cuneiform.

Thanks for the link–very interesting. Actually, because the Tov chapter shows that the Greek translators treated this construction inconsistently, I’d say they also probably struggled with what to do with it. The infinitive absolute falls out even in late Biblical Hebrew, so this infinitive/finite verb construction probably also fell out of spoken Hebrew (whatever that may have looked like) by the turn of the era. I’m simply saying that we know more about Biblical Hebrew now than they did then. Is something an error if some doesn’t have a way of knowing any better? Hmmm…

Another Semitic language will really enhance your understanding of Akkadian, and vice versa. There’s tons and tons of work to be done in cuneiform studies, so go for it!!

 

[Nooj]

Except for Genesis and the book of Job (where Satan is not exactly Job’s friend), you are right; there’s little evidence of Satan’s existence at all. I heard a Word of Faith preacher once say that was because people weren’t prepared to deal with him yet, what with not having the Name of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit. His interp, not mine.

Job is one of my favourite books. Such a great work. But any malevolence attributable to Satan (or should we say the Satan?) for his part in tormenting Job can also be blamed on God’s allowance of Satan’s actions. Whatever his motivations for causing God to doubt in Job’s trusworthiness in the first place, if Satan is evil for causing calamity, that raises the uncomfortable issue of whether God is to be judged similarly.

I’ve heard that in modern Judaism, Satan is even considered God’s counsel or prosecutor.

I recently read a sci-fi/fantasy book in which the archangels were main characters, and the character of Satan (named Morningstar) had an interesting take on humans: “Mortals have never been an interest of mine, honestly. To me, they were just God’s mud dolls animated by His holy breath for some sick experiment in free will. I normally let them play in their dirt and filth without a second thought.” That seems to echo the OT’s depiction of the relationship between Satan and humans.

DaveBj

Is this the Lucifer character from DC? I liked that take on him.

 

[DaveBj]

Job is one of my favourite books. Such a great work. But any malevolence attributable to Satan (or should we say the Satan?) for his part in tormenting Job can also be blamed on God’s allowance of Satan’s actions. Whatever his motivations for causing God to doubt in Job’s trusworthiness in the first place, if Satan is evil for causing calamity, that raises the uncomfortable issue of whether God is to be judged similarly.

I’ve heard that in modern Judaism, Satan is even considered God’s counsel or prosecutor.

Is this the Lucifer character from DC? I liked that take on him.

Some modern evangelicals, especially in the Word of Faith movement, also depict Satan as the “accuser of the brethren,” as he is called in the Revelation. I believe that you are correct about the role of God’s permissiveness in Satan’s torment of Job, but since God exists outside time, He already knew what the outcome of the test would be; there was no doubt of Job’s character on His part. As to God’s responsibility in causing or allowing calamity, remember that this earthly life is not the be-all and end-all of our total existence. Within the context of eternity, the calamities that happened to Job weren’t even a pimple.

I am unfamiliar with the Lucifer character from DC, so I can’t comment on that, except to say that if you are using DC to refer to the District of Columbia, I can think of many candidates for Lucifer, or at least for his agents.

DaveBj