Hebrew Poetry, Whales and Sea-Monsters

[Olavarria]

Ether 6:10

10)And thus they were driven forth; and no monster of the sea(????) could break them, neither whale(????????) that could mar them; and they did have light continually, whether it was above the water or under the water.

Notes

whale(Job 7:12)

sea monster(Lamentations 4:3)

Polysemy in the Hebrew Bible

Parallelism in the Hebrew Bible

[David Bokovoy]

Ether 6:10

10)And thus they were driven forth; and no monster of the sea(????) could break them, neither whale(????????) that could mar them; and they did have light continually, whether it was above the water or under the water.

Notes

whale(Job 7:12)

sea monster(Lamentations 4:3)

Polysemy in the Hebrew Bible

Parallelism in the Hebrew Bible

This is a fascinating verse! Thanks for drawing our attention to it. I really like the proposal that the sea monster here is a tanin. If I were translating the verse into Biblical Hebrew, that is certainly the term I would select. It seems to me, however, that a type of parallelism occurs between "monster of the sea" and "whale." So the two terms should be related, albeit separate to reflect the similar yet distinct verbs "to break," and "to mar." Therefore, in a translation, I would preserve the distinction apparent in the original English.

I would want to opt for one of the mythical beasts such as Leviathan, but it would take some thought before I felt comfortable settling on which one.

Love ya,

--DB

[volgadon]

Could be either. Isaiah 51:9 makes tanin parallel to Rahab. Job 7:11 is another one about tanin which also makes reference to Yam. I think distinctions between these four probably became blurred among later generations of Israelites, so any of them (with the exception of Rahab) would work.

[The_Monk]

Tanin can't be part of the Ur-text, unless you think the Jaredites spoke Hebrew. We'd have to be pulling out some kind of Sumerian/Akkadian equivalent, of which there are several to pick from.

/pedantic objection

[Olavarria]

Tanin can't be part of the Ur-text, unless you think the Jaredites spoke Hebrew. We'd have to be pulling out some kind of Sumerian/Akkadian equivalent, of which there are several to pick from.

/pedantic objection

But isn't "The Book of Ether" really just Moroni's redaction of Mosiah's miraculous translation? Tannin could be in Moroni's redaction IF Mosiah translated the Jaredite plates into some form of Hebrew. I don't think Moroni was working with the original Jaredite plates.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

[handys003]

Hey nice pic of an Orca! Orcas are dolphins though and not a whale.