31 Rejoicing in His earth, And having my delight in the children of men.”
We have, with Symmachus, translated שׁחקים (from שׁחק, Arab. shaḳ, to grind, to make thin) by αἰθέρα, for so the fine transparent strata of air above the hanging clouds are called - a poetic name of the firmament רקיע. The making firm עמּץ is not to be understood locally, but internally of the spreading out of the firmament over the earth settled for continuance (an expression such as Psa 78:23). In 28b the Masora notices the plur. עינות instead of עינות with לית as unicum (cf. Michlol 191a); the transition of the sound is as in גּלית from galajta. The inf. עזוז appears on the first look to require a transitive signification, as the lxx and the Targ., the Graec. Venet. and Luther (da er festiget die Brünnen der tieffen = when He makes firm the fountains of the deep) have rendered it. Elster accordingly believes that this signification must be maintained, because בּ here introduces creative activity, and in itself is probably the transitive use of עזז, as the Arab. 'azz shows: when He set His עז against the מים עזּים (Isa 43:16). But the absence of the subject is in favour of the opinion that here, as everywhere else, it is intransitive; only we may not, with Hitzig, translate: when the fountains of the flood raged wildly; but, since 28b, if not a creative efficiency, must yet express a creative work, either as Ewald, with reference to מעוז, fortress: when they became firm, or better as Fleischer, with reference to מים עזים: when they broke forth with power, with strong fulness. Whether the suff. of חקּו, 29a, refers back to the sea or to Jahve, is decided after the parallel פּיו. If this word is equivalent to its coast (cf. Psa 104:9), then both suffixes refer to the sea; but the coast of the sea, or of a river, is called שׂפה, not פּה, which only means ostium (mouth), not ora. Also Isa 19:7 will require to be translated: by the mouth of the Nile, and that פי, Psa 133:2, may denote the under edge, arises from this, that a coat has a mouth above as well as below, i.e., is open. Thus both suff. are to be referred to God, and פיו d is to be determined after Job 23:12. The clause beginning with ומים corresponds in periodizing discourse to a clause with ut, Ewald, §338. בּחוּקו is the same form, only written plene, as Pro 8:27, בּחקו = בּחקּו = בּחקקו.[1]
- ↑ One might regard it as modified from בחקקו; but that שׁוּרי, Psa 102:12, is modified from שׁררי, or הורי, Gen 49:26, from הררי, is by no means certain.
