Genesis 1:1 - 2:3

["Mark E. Shoulson" <cbmvax!uunet!CTR.COLUMBIA.EDU!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!shoulson>]

>Date:         Tue, 28 Jan 1992 11:31:26 GMT
>From: CJ FINE <C.J.Fine%BRADFORD.AC.UK@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu>

>> .i bacru fa la cevni lu .e'o ferti fa le terdi loi srasu je spati noi

>Surely this is "srasu joi spati" (or perhaps "jo'u") - as it is, it is
>the mass of things which are both grass and plants which incidentally
>...

Actually, the {je} was intentional.  The Hebrew phrase is "tadshe ha'aretz
deshe, `esev...", which goes something like "let the earth be grassed with
grass, herb(sing, massified)...."  "`esev" and "deshe" are near synonyms for
grass, with the former having more an implication of the individual blades
and the latter implying more of "lawn".  The lack of a conjunction in the
Hebrew could be viewd as asyndeton (leaving out a conjunction), and maybe
it is, but I decided to go for more of a parallel view, things which are
grass-and-plants.  Hmmm.  I'd still get something of that meaning with
{joi}, since it'd be a tanru connector...  I have to ponder this.

>> .i finti fa la cevni lei barda xasydanlu .e piro loi jmive poi
>> befydzu zi'epoi se ferti lei djacu (ku'o) zi'e ne ja'i lora jutsi ge'u
>Do you mean "befydzu" here? The RSV just has "moves" - haven't checked
>the Hebrew. Reading it cold, it says "all the living things that both crawl
>and are brought forth from the waters", which seemed odd to me.

The Hebrew has "all the living spirit(s) that creep..."  (eep, forgot the
"spirit".  See what I mean?  An experienced translator wouldn't worry about
something like that, only a nutty greenhorn like me).  Actually, I can't be
authoritative on that verb.  It's the same one that I translated as
"befydzu" later on, where it's more obvious.  As to the odd redundancy of
the verse, that's not my fault:  "God created the great sea-creatures, and
all the creeping living spirit[s] that swarm the waters..."  The last
clause is difficult in the original.  I translated the "swarming" verb as
"ferti" because it implies the fertility of growth and stuff, more so than
just "brought forth".


>> .i go'i lu'a piro loi terdi jmive .e piro loi tsani cipni .e piro loi
>> befydzu be le terdi lu'u noi ke'a ponse lo jmive pruxi ku'o mu'i lenu citka
>> .e'a do'a li'u
>It seems to me that if you are going to use lu'a, you should give it a
>set to work on, or at least use alternation. I would read what you wrote
>as individuals that are earth-living AND sky-birds AND creeping on the
>earth. "ce" or "a".

Hmmmm.  This {lu'a} thingy is not something I'm very familiar with.  But
your reading implies that the {.e}s are getting interpreted like {je}s in a
tanru or something.  Is this what {lu'a} does?  I don't like {.a}, but
maybe {ce}.

>> mulno fa le tsani .ebo le terdi .e piro loi jenmi girzu pe ri
>I wondered about "ebo" - it looked as if you were trying to group, which
>is significant syntactically but not, I think, semantically, since "e"
>is associative. Having read your note about "ri" I see what you were
>trying to do, but I'm dubious whether it works.

>I'm very dubious about "jenmi girzu" - I only know the word "tz'va'ot"
>in this context, so it could be that your translation is accurate, but I
>would much prefer to translate it as "so'irmei" or "(so'ir)xabju".

I'm also dubious, about both.  "Tz'va`ot" means something like "hosts", but
the fact is that {jenmi girzu} is almost certainly a very bad rendering.  I
assume you mean {so'imei} and not {so'irmei}, since the latter would be
"many-measure", and not "multitude".  {[so'ir]xabju} sounds really nice,
though.

>> . . .  I am fond of using afterthought
>> possessives (as oppoed to"le vo'a tarmi"), especially here where it's
>> actually a place, and because in Hebrew the possessive is a declension
>> affecting chiefly the end of the word also, or else another word
>> afterwards.  Besides, you can be so much more specific with "po/po'e/pe" if
>> you use afterthought.  Note also that I had to attach the "ta'i" to "loi
>> remna" otherwise you get "'god' is-a-creator...with-form...", which again
>> isn't what we want.  Is there a better way to do this?
>I agree about the afterthought possessive, particularly here.
>Another way to do the "ta'i" is
>   .i tarmi be vo'a finti fa la cevni loi remna

>I can't see a way to get the word order as the original though - "co"
>won't do, because he is a "finti" not a "tarmi".

Hmm.  Using a tanru.  That's pretty good, but I'm always a little nervous
about complex tanru.  Besides, it runs into the same problem:  your tanru
is prone to being interpreted as "God is a shape-of-God-creator of
humanity", thus "God is-a-shape-of-God and a-creator...", by parallel
lujvo.  Then again, my next few verses (with {seri'a}, or maybe {tezu'e})
have a similar ambiguity (with the result that *who* has God's shape?), and
actually even the original has it a bit (though nobody notices).

>> .i seri'a loza'i se tarmi le tarmi be la cevni cu finti fo'a (???)
>I would definitely prefer a "kei" before (or instead of) "cu" - this
>was about the hardest line in the whole passage to make sense of - in
>fact, first I thought the whole sentence was a tagged sumti, then I missed
>the fact that everything up to the "cu" was governed by the tag, and
>thought "le tarmi" was the x1. What you've written is grammatical, but
>it confused me.

Yeah, I can see where a {kei} would be nice there.  But the {cu} still
wouldn't be elidable; otherwise the nu/kei phrase would become part of a
tanru with {finti}.

>> Again remembered "vo'a".  Is it okay to use it inside a "noi" clause to
>> refer to the x1 outside, or does that have to be flagged?
>Seems right to me.

Maybe, but less so to me, now.  Ditto the "neja'i lori jutsi" construction.
I think we do need an "outer-utterance" pro-sumti.

>> .i cesto'edapma (/?!/) fa la cevni le zemoi djedi gi'e cesri'a ri ki'u lenu
>> ca ri cadysti piro lei se gunka poi la cevni cu finti je zbasu
>> Holy-opposite-of-curses "god" the seventh day and holy-makes the-last
>> justified-by the-event: during the-last idly-ceases all-of the-mass-of
>> that-worked-on which-rest. "god" invents-and-makes.
>> Again that "blesses" lujvo.  Should that be "poi" or "noi"?  Is it okay to
>> use "ri'a" in "cesria", or do I need a different causative?

>How about "cesygalfi" (don't know the rafsi offhand)?

The only shorter form is {cesyga'i}, which is hardly better.  The meaning,
however, is very good.  Better than {cesri'a}.  Maybe I'll change it.

>          Kolin

~mark (shoulson@ctr.columbia.edu)