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Thread: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

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    Default THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Well, it's Sunday again, and time for another "happy" or "helpful" translation from the Old Testament. I'm fairly proud of today's and I hope it makes up somewhat from my last topic post on Egypt.

    Sometimes in my work as a translator it makes me sad to learn that portions of the Biblical text contain very exciting and important remarks, but those ideas
    have not been provided to us by our traditional Biblical scholars.

    It is much more difficult to try to place ourselves in the shoes of these ancient authors of the Old Testament, and shake out the information that is contained
    therein, but it's so very important that we do so, and well worth the time and trouble that it entails.

    Proverbs 26:16 (King James Version) "The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason."

    The English Standard Version is : " The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can answer sensibly." Which is somewhat closer to the original Massoretic Hebrew textual meaning, but far from all that we should gain from this wisdom.

    But what does all that mean to us?

    Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible gives us their comments towards the deeper meanings behind the text:

    "The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit. It is a sort of a solecism, a kind of a contradiction in terms for a sluggard to be wise, who is so slothful as to make no use of the means of getting wisdom and knowledge. And it must be a mere conceit in him that he is wise, and especially that he is wiser than seven men that can render a reason."

    And they continue with:

    " The sluggard is here one who is too idle to think a matter out, and considers his own cursory view as sure to be right. He is one who deems study to be an unnecessary weariness of the flesh, and flatters himself that he is quite able without it to give a satisfactory account of any question presented to him. Than seven men that can render a reason."

    And they explain that "Seven is the number of completeness. The idle fool sets more value by his own judgment than by the sense of any number of wise men."

    And they point out that in the margin of the Revised Version of the Old Testament chapter it adds "that can answer discreetly, is perhaps nearer the Hebrew, which implies the being able to return a wise and proper answer to anything asked of them."

    This all sounds very complete and lovingly comforting. But it's not what they meant at all.

    Gill's Exposition and other similar explanations tend to go on and on with examples, and while I salute their efforts, a more informed translation will provide all that we need to know to not only understand this Verse completely, but to locate the associated Chapter and Verse that it alludes to.

    As usual, I will furnish word by word definitions, and then place them in the correct Verb-Subject-Object order that ancient Hebrew used (Ate John the apple), rather than
    our modern English form of Subject-Verb-Object (John ate the apple), so that we can better understand just who does what to whom.


    wise, wise (man), shrewd, crafty, cunning, wily, subtle
    sluggish, lazy,
    in, at, to, on, among, with, towards; according to, by, because of
    eye, as showing mental qualities
    + suffix indicating "his"
    from, out of, on account of, off, on the side of, since, above, than, so that not, more than
    seven (cardinal number)
    to return, turn back, relinquish, give in payment, to bring back to mind
    And this last word is properly a taste, that is, (figuratively) perception, judgment, decision, decree. In Hebrew it is Ta`am, "the sense of taste," "perception," from Ta`am, "to taste," "to perceive"). So rather than "render" it actually refers to perception.

    Placing that in sentence order we have:

    V S O
    lying lazily in his cunning mental qualities,
    reminds (US) of (the) seven perceptions.

    As an FYI, while the KJV defines the subject as Sluggard, which has a meaning of sluggish, lazy, a habitually lazy person, they make this into a noun, and they employ the word wiser as the verb. But in contrast to that, we can easily locate the verbal form of lazy, such as lazied, lazying, or to lie lazily (as I have done).

    If we picture a person who lays back, sure of himself and his position, not bothering to get up to solve a problem since he knows that he will be able to do so in the comfort of his sofa, then we can understand their description of a person who is lazily lying about, sure of his cunning mental qualities. Let others do his bidding, let others do his work - he's a thinker, and can find comfort or lie lazily in that understanding of his cunning. He feel superior to everyone, with his cunning.

    But what is this mention of something that "reminds us of the seven perceptions"?   I don't recall that phrase in the Bible text. But can't we discover it by looking? Yes, we can and will.


    Here are three verses (Psalm 135:15-17) in the English Standard Version :

    15 The idols of the nations are silver and gold,
    the work of human hands.
    16 They have mouths, but do not speak;
    they have eyes, but do not see;
    17 they have ears, but do not hear,
    nor is there any breath in their mouths.

    One item that we should understand here is that the word "nations" from this translation is actually the Hebrew word Goyim, meaning Gentiles, or non-Jewish people. It's pretty clear that this is what it means, and not "nations",
    which comes from "the nations that are not our nations", or foreigners, or the semi-derogatory term for non-Hebrews. Perhaps we should best understand
    this as representing a chosen nation of Yahweh (Hebrews) and others that were not specifically chosen by Yahweh as his people.

    With that in mind, here's what we have:

    Psalms 135: 15-17 1 2 3
    The idols of the Goyim are silver and gold; the work of human hands.

    [The Gentiles (Goyim) worship silver, gold, and the materialistic inventions of human hands.]

    They have MOUTHS, but they do not speak; 4
    [They have the ability to call on Yahweh as the sole God, but they call not. ]

    they have EYES, but they do not see; 5
    [They have the intelligence (eyes) to understand his teachings but do not seem to understand.]

    They have EARS, but they do not hear, 6
    [They have ears the hear the Holy Commandments but do not listen to (or obey) them.]

    and there is no BREATH in their mouths. 7
    [The Creative breath, the Word of the Elohim, that we see in Genesis 2:7, "And Yahweh Elohim formed man of the dust and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life."]

    They have mouths, but there is no Creative Breath, no spirit of Yahweh in them.
    The breath of Creation; Yahweh's power, where the senses have a theological aspect.

    So by correctly translating another verse, we are led to an understanding of the concept of the seven
    perceptions from the Old Testament, and we can now reflect upon that information as well.

    It seems as if it indicates a type of caution, whereby we are told that the Gentiles, or Goyim, are particularly susceptible to the errors of gold, silver, and material creations, and all humans can fall prey to the Mouth that speaks not, the Eyes that see not, the Ears that hear not, and the Breath, the creative spirit of Jehovah.

    As always your comments are appreciated.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Thank you for providing the detailed analysis of your work. I am ignorant of the intricacies of translating ancient text and find this quite interesting.
    Happiness comes from within, nowhere else.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Quote Posted by Vangelo (here)
    Thank you for providing the detailed analysis of your work. I am ignorant of the intricacies of translating ancient text and find this quite interesting.
    You're most welcome.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    What is it like up there in your cabin? Any wild critters? Sounds like the ideal place to contemplate, translate, etc. Do you have running water or is it down to the nearest stream for a soak? A bit chilly in the winter! Give us city and civilization types a mental picture of your world.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Quote Posted by amor (here)
    What is it like up there in your cabin? Any wild critters? Sounds like the ideal place to contemplate, translate, etc. Do you have running water or is it down to the nearest stream for a soak? A bit chilly in the winter! Give us city and civilization types a mental picture of your world.
    We have plenty of small game. We get our water from a natural spring under the mountain top.
    We have no central heat or air, and it's peaceful here. But writing is work. And even if they show you
    pictures of authors sitting on the beach while writing, it's still work. Ha Ha.
    Imagine having Humming Birds outside your window, Tucans in your yard, and million dollar views.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Quote Posted by Jim_Duyer (here)
    ... But writing is work. And even if they show you pictures of authors sitting on the beach while writing, it's still work. Ha Ha. Imagine having Humming Birds outside your window, Tucans in your yard, and million dollar views.
    It certainly is. I have self-published 3 books and it took a lot of discipline and commitment. It is also very rewarding.
    Happiness comes from within, nowhere else.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Quote Posted by Vangelo (here)
    Quote Posted by Jim_Duyer (here)
    ... But writing is work. And even if they show you pictures of authors sitting on the beach while writing, it's still work. Ha Ha. Imagine having Humming Birds outside your window, Tucans in your yard, and million dollar views.
    It certainly is. I have self-published 3 books and it took a lot of discipline and commitment. It is also very rewarding.
    Good for you! I think I should let you know about something I found out yesterday. A reader from Holland thanked me for the book but asked why I had chosen to publish it as a collection - with perhaps a dozen other books, and at such a good price. It turns out that someone in Europe is purchasing one copy of ebooks, placing a dozen or so in various groups - there were several dozen to choose from she said - and repeating this while keeping all of the money. Some of the ebooks were bought and returned the same hour, as well.
    Because of this, I have decided to only publish print books from now on. Oh, I left out the best part. They apparently have a rating section on the page as well, similar to Azon, and one purchaser of my book was complaining because the last chapter had been left out! Apparently they think that by doing this they avoid fraud charges, I imagine.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    To me the essence of religious writings is mystical, or spiritual. All religious teachings point to that connection to an invisible reality. The higher energy one, not the lower, in fact advising against falling into the lower, as all the invisible worlds exist in opposite directions of the spectrum of reality, just like the light spectrum has two opposite ends.

    So seen in that context this verse is pointing to intuition, rather than logical reasoning, which is still confined to the realm of space/time.
    And Jehova (even if he is not the actual Creative Source, but a highly evolved spiritual being) revealed his message to the Israelites, via their prophets/seers, at the time of Old Testament records.

    Revelations that came at later times did not focus specifically of the Israelites, as we had Christian teachers going all over the planet to bring the news of an afterlife and the communication links to the invisible worlds via faith, prayer, intuition and inspiration. With emphasis on love and compassion, as the pharisees had become devoid thereof, being stuck in Mosaic laws.

    Then later still around the 18th century came confusion because imagination replaced true intuition and inspiration. And imagination often comes from the lower end of the spiritual spectrum.
    Our current civilization now needs a return to reason, in balance with intuition, and compassion.

    All of humanity need to recognize one single Source and reconcile their differences, then the cycles of all prophecies will be completed.
    So translating religious writings is best done by combining reason with the intuition that those texts propose.

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Appreciate the insight Ulli. Well said.

    Pamela

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    Default Re: THE OLD TESTAMENT "Seven Perceptions" THAT YOU NEVER HEARD OF

    Quote Posted by ulli (here)
    Our current civilization now needs a return to reason, in balance with intuition, and compassion.
    Amen to the part above.

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