[Mesorah] Translation of the verb "yiv'al"

Micha Berger micha at aishdas.org
Mon Feb 12 15:09:46 PST 2018


On Mon, Feb 12, 2018 at 04:44:50PM -0500, Zev Sero via Mesorah wrote:
: On 12/02/18 16:14, Micha Berger via Mesorah wrote:
: >In leshon Chazal, the term be'ilah / bo'el refers to marital intimacy.
: >
: >What about in Yeshaiah 62:5?
: >
: >כי-יבעל בחור בתולה יבעלוך בניך, ומשוש חתן על-כלה ישיש עליך אלקיך
: 
: See Yonasan, Rashi, Metzudos, Radak, all of whom translate it as
: living together, settling down into the same home.

Actually TY (and Rashi, who quotes him verbatum) could be euphamistically
phrased, just like "living with" does today. (A couple of decades
ago?) No mention of the noun "home". And the seifa of the pasuq is a
word-for-word translation, not much help.

Radaq uses the word "yiv'al", which doesn't say much about translating. If
anything, it may imply he believes the word did NOT change meaning in
Chazal's hands. Anyway, his comment on the paralleling 2nd clause is
just about how there is more sason vesimchah biymei chupasahh, because
they are new. Again, not much help with translating the pasuq.

Metzidas David: misyashvim yachad mibeli pirud. Live in the same home
and never part, or intimacy without clothing separating them?

So, I had hit the rishonim Sefaria offered, and still wasn't sure.

R' Berechyah (Devarim Rabba 2:37) lists the 10 times in Tanakh BY are
called a kallah. Obviously a lot of them are from Shir haShirim. This
pasuq is on the list as well. The notion that this imagery is meant
eroically is of a kind (if more explicit) than "mah yafu dodayikh achosi
khalah", from the same list.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A pious Jew is not one who worries about his fellow
micha at aishdas.org        man's soul and his own stomach; a pious Jew worries
http://www.aishdas.org   about his own soul and his fellow man's stomach.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                       - Rav Yisrael Salanter



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