Peter, The issues you raise here are predominantly questions of historical construction with two different sources. It's not really a linguistic issue pertaining to the Hebrew. The Hebrew is quite straightforward, indicating the laying of foundations for the Jerusalem temple. The historical problem is determining when this occurred, and that is not straightforward.
Since historical discussions are not really permitted in this forum, apart from clarifying linguistic issues, I will only give a brief thumb-sketch of the issues, but will not invite any further exploration. For that, I'd refer you to relevant secondary literature. Ezra portrays a foundation laying before the time of Darius, but Haggai portrays a foundation laying during the time of Darius. These can either be harmonised by concluding there were two foundation laying ceremonies, or else seen as independent sources, each with a different opinion on when exactly the foundation was laid. There are many more historiographical issues involved in these considerations, but B-Hebrew is not the place to explore them. We need to confine our discussion to the Hebrew. GEORGE ATHAS Director of Postgraduate Studies, Moore Theological College (moore.edu.au) Sydney, Australia From: <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2012 20:33:14 +0200 To: B-Hebrew <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> Subject: [b-hebrew] Haggai 2,8 + Ezra 3,10 Dear Friends of B-Heb, by comparing Haggai and Ezra I found a problem that I can't solve on my own: In Haggai 2,18 it states: "from the day that the foundation of the LORD'S temple was laid" (NKJ) In Ezra 3,10 we read: "When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the LORD" (NKJ) In both instances the writer uses the verb JaSaD. What is the difference between both occurences, as a foundation can't be laid twice, I guess, and there are some years between both passages. Is it better to understand the verb as "beginning to build" rather than laying the foundation? Thank you again for all help ! Yours Peter M. Streitenberger, Germany _______________________________________________ b-hebrew mailing list [email protected] http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
