Ancient Wisdom Today » Leviticus http://maer.vidanovaphilly.org Ancient Wisdom Today: seeking to understand the past to make sense of the present Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:09:17 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 מן and the Sinner in Leviticus http://maer.vidanovaphilly.org/2009/12/05/min-and-the-sinner-in-leviticus/ http://maer.vidanovaphilly.org/2009/12/05/min-and-the-sinner-in-leviticus/#comments Sat, 05 Dec 2009 16:28:08 +0000 Maer http://maer.vidanovaphilly.org/?p=719 The exchange between Jacob Milgrom and Roy Gane on the proper meaning of the preposition מן (usually translated in its privative sense from) in some passages of Leviticus gives us an opportunity to take a look at the semantic possibilities of מן that may escape the notice of a  student beginning to learn Hebrew.

To be more specific, the question is whether the meaning of מן in the חטאת pericopes in Leviticus– passages concerning purification offerings (traditionally translated as sin offerings)–should be translated as from (privative) or as for, on account of, because of (causitive). My goal in this post is not to summarize the arguments for and against the position of each scholar, but to show how important the right understanding of מן, and prepositions in general, may be for reconstructing whole systems or even getting behind the theology of a book.

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