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First available on January 26, 2008

Pôth 'opening'

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	Author Bio
	Jonathan Went teaches biblical Hebrew and Jewish background to Christianity. His "Biblical Hebrew made easy" course can be found at www.biblicalhebrew.com. He specialises in Hermeneutics, Judaica and Patristics (Early Church). He is the editor of the new Hebraic Roots journal, Roots and Branches (www.rootsandbranchespress.com) and also runs www.BMSoftware.com a biblical and multilingual software site.

The word POt pôth (Strong's #6596, x2) is very rare occuring just twice, each of which is untranslatable. The most likely root verbs are PFtFh pâthâh (Strong's #6601, x28) and the more common PFtAx pâthach (Strong's #6605, x144) both meaning "to be open, spread, loose" or an unused root PWt pûwth, meaning something similar.

The first occurrence is in the description of Hiram's bronzework for the temple, all describing concave vessels and the usual translations suggest "hinges" for the doors, the "panels" (Latin Septuagint), "sockets" (NRSV, NIV) or similar. This could mean the lower half of conventional hinges in which a door with a male hinge drops down onto female lower half hinge sockets. It could, however, refer to hollowed out locks too.

"the basins, the trimmers, the bowls, the ladles, and the censers of pure gold; and the hinges of gold, both for the doors of the inner room and for the doors of the main hall of the temple." (1 Kings 7:50)

The other use is in God's judgement on Judah's arrogance:

"Therefore the Lord will strike with a scab The crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, And the LORD will uncover their secret parts." (Isaiah 3:17)

The euphemistic "secret parts" is quite consistent in translations except the NAS, NIV which render "scalps", making the women bald, although this is consistent parallelistically with the earlier "crown of the head".

It does not fit so well, however, with the idea of an opening, which is why early Jewish commentators like Kimchi regarded it as the female genital region, the space or opening between the legs.

This seems better since the previous verse, speaks of the head and the legs, so the symmetry of parallelism is not necessary for elucidation:

"Moreover the LORD says: "Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, And walk with outstretched necks And wanton eyes, Walking and mincing as they go, Making a jingling with their feet" (Isaiah 3:16)

There is a judgement on their heads, a scab, and upon their female genitalia, they will be exposed.

If you want more of the same read on in Isaiah 3 from vv.16-24 , a complete stripping of all their finery, ornamental and perhaps physical, for most of the Hebrew terms are hapax legomena, "words only occuring once" and hence like POt pôth difficult to translate.

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