Psalm 110:3 — "thy people" or "with thee" and meaning of the verse.

S

Sam Jer

Puritan Board Sophomore
I will start by asking my questions on Psalm 110:3 and then explain the background as these questions are the "important part".

For All:
1. If the verse is indeed supposed to read "with thee", how do we interpret this?
A. What are the "gifts" (נדבות)
B. What do the beuties of holiness have to do with it?
C. What is the dew of His youth and what does the womb of Mary have to do with it?
2. How do we interpret the verse if the vowel pointers and subsequently, modern translators, are right?
A. what is the day of power and what does it mean that we shall offer ourselves willingly?
B. What do the beuties of holiness have to do with it?
C. What is the dew of His youth and what does the womb of Mary have to do with it?

For the Hebrew scholars:
3. Are there any linguistic reasons to prefer one of the readings bellow over the other of which I am unaware?
4. Is my comment on "shall offer themselves willingly" being an akward translation sound, or is my modern Hebrew distorting things?


Psalm 110:3 reads:
"Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth." (English, KJV)


Now for those who know the languages, in Hebrew, it reads:
"עמך נדבת ביום חילך בהדרי קדש מרחם משחר לך טל ילדתיך" (Hebrew, without vowel points)
and in the septuagint:
"μετὰ σοῦ ἡ ἀρχὴ ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τῆς δυνάμεώς σου ἐν ταῖς λαμπρότησιν τῶν ἁγίων ἐκ γαστρὸς πρὸ ἑωσφόρου ἐξεγέννησά σε." (Greek, LXX)

Now I don't know Greek (and only know Hebrew because it happens to be my native tounge), but "μετὰ σοῦ" means "with thee", or so I am told. Translated from Greek, the passage actually goes:
"With thee is dominion in the day of thy power, in the splendours of thy saints: I have begotten thee from the womb before the morning".

Read without vowel points, the Hebrew allows "with thou". The Hebrew for "with thee" (imcha, עִמְךָ) is spelled the same as "thy people" (amcha, עַמְךָ). The diffrence is a single vowel.
I am not sure how "dominion" happened, but the hebrew נדבות (shall offer themselves willingly) could also mean "donations" or "gifts", which seems to me to be more natural than "shall offer themselves willingly", a rather akward interpetation.
 
Sam Jer said:
I will start by asking my questions on Psalm 110:3 and then explain the background as these questions are the "important part".

For All:
1. If the verse is indeed supposed to read "with thee", how do we interpret this?
A. What are the "gifts" (נדבות)
B. What do the beuties of holiness have to do with it?
C. What is the dew of His youth and what does the womb of Mary have to do with it?
2. How do we interpret the verse if the vowel pointers and subsequently, modern translators, are right?
A. what is the day of power and what does it mean that we shall offer ourselves willingly?
B. What do the beuties of holiness have to do with it?
C. What is the dew of His youth and what does the womb of Mary have to do with it?

For the Hebrew scholars:
3. Are there any linguistic reasons to prefer one of the readings bellow over the other of which I am unaware?
4. Is my comment on "shall offer themselves willingly" being an akward translation sound, or is my modern Hebrew distorting things?


Psalm 110:3 reads:
"Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth." (English, KJV)


Now for those who know the languages, in Hebrew, it reads:
"עמך נדבת ביום חילך בהדרי קדש מרחם משחר לך טל ילדתיך" (Hebrew, without vowel points)
and in the septuagint:
"μετὰ σοῦ ἡ ἀρχὴ ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τῆς δυνάμεώς σου ἐν ταῖς λαμπρότησιν τῶν ἁγίων ἐκ γαστρὸς πρὸ ἑωσφόρου ἐξεγέννησά σε." (Greek, LXX)

Now I don't know Greek (and only know Hebrew because it happens to be my native tounge), but "μετὰ σοῦ" means "with thee", or so I am told. Translated from Greek, the passage actually goes:
"With thee is dominion in the day of thy power, in the splendours of thy saints: I have begotten thee from the womb before the morning".

Read without vowel points, the Hebrew allows "with thou". The Hebrew for "with thee" (imcha, עִמְךָ) is spelled the same as "thy people" (amcha, עַמְךָ). The diffrence is a single vowel.
I am not sure how "dominion" happened, but the hebrew נדבות (shall offer themselves willingly) could also mean "donations" or "gifts", which seems to me to be more natural than "shall offer themselves willingly", a rather akward interpetation.
Click to expand...
Just commenting on 3 and 4 for now: the Hebrew word nedavot specifically means freewill offerings, but it can also be used adverbially to mean "freely, willingly" (see Hos 14:5). Judges 5:2 has the Hithpael of the related verb in a similar context, meaning "the people volunteer". This is the translation adopted by most modern translations, in line with the KJV. The word chayyil can mean "strength" or "power" (KJV, ESV), but it can also mean "army"; hence CSB "Your people will volunteer on your day of battle." (There is debate among English translations whether "in holy splendor" goes with what precedes or follows).

As you note, the LXX is reading different vowels for the first word and then heads off in a periphrastic direction in the second half of the verse. But there is no particular reason to challenge the KJV translation of the second half, even though its meaning isn't particularly transparent. It's probably the interpretive difficulty of the second half that makes the LXX go in a different direction rather than any particular textual or translational challenges. That's not a complete answer to your questions but it starts you off in the right direction.
 
iainduguid said:
Just commenting on 3 and 4 for now: the Hebrew word nedavot specifically means freewill offerings, but it can also be used adverbially to mean "freely, willingly" (see Hos 14:5). Judges 5:2 has the Hithpael of the related verb in a similar context, meaning "the people volunteer". This is the translation adopted by most modern translations, in line with the KJV. The word chayyil can mean "strength" or "power" (KJV, ESV), but it can also mean "army"; hence CSB "Your people will volunteer on your day of battle." (There is debate among English translations whether "in holy splendor" goes with what precedes or follows).

As you note, the LXX is reading different vowels for the first word and then heads off in a periphrastic direction in the second half of the verse. But there is no particular reason to challenge the KJV translation of the second half, even though its meaning isn't particularly transparent. It's probably the interpretive difficulty of the second half that makes the LXX go in a different direction rather than any particular textual or translational challenges. That's not a complete answer to your questions but it starts you off in the right direction.
Click to expand...
Did you get the right reference in Hosea?
Judges, as you mentioned, used the root נ.ד.ב n.d.v in a verb form, making it less akward.
As for the second half of the verse, my question did not concern it. The verse could totally read:
"With thee are the freewill offerings, in the beauties of holiness: from the womb of the morning, thou hast the dew of thy youth", which would be easier to interpret in my opinion.
I read patristic commentaries on this a long time ago and I think I recall they widely held that this had to do with the first coming in Bethlehem (don't take my word for it though! it was quite a while back)
 
The Hebrew versification is Hosea 14:5; English verse 4.

The rendering you suggest is not impossible, if you emend the vowels in the MT following the LXX. Patristic commentaries are of course likely reading the LXX and may not be aware of the MT. But when the MT makes good sense as it stands, I'm reluctant to emend the text.
 
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