Cyber-Chapel Blog

Isa 9:5 (English translations v. 6) gives a series of names for the promised Child. Modern translations, motivated by the idea that the names are paired, group them into four, of which the first is “Wonderful Counselor” or (NIV) “Extraordinary Strategist.” Older versions such as the KJV and the ASV, set “Wonderful” apart as a name by itself. How many should we understand?

The older punctuation in fact goes back to the Massoretic punctuation of the verse. Every word in the Hebrew Bible carries a punctuation mark. The system is quite complex, and most of the marks are discussed in the standard grammars under the rubric “accents.” (Maqqeph is the one punctuation mark that is not included among the accents, and indicates that the word on which it falls is to be considered a single unit with the following word for purposes of accentuation.)

The accents fall into two categories. Some are conjunctive, indicating that the word on which they fall forms a phrase with what follows. Others are disjunctive, indicating that there is some sort of a break between the word they mark and what follows.

The accents in each group form a hierarchy. For example, in the disjunctive accents, the strongest one divides the verse into two halves. The next strongest divides each of these halves, and so on.

The accents are more than punctuation.  In the synagogue, they are the basis for chanting the text, leading to their description as “cantillation.” The analysis of Lars Lode emphasizes their discourse function as markers of prominence, rather than their syntactical function. But as punctuation, they often yield important insights in how we are to group the words of the text.

The word “wonderful” in Isa 9:5 bears the accent telisha gedolah. This is one of the weakest of the disjunctive accents, but it is a disjunctive. In the other pairs of names, the punctuation groups them. “Mighty God” joins them with e strongest of the conjunctive accents, “Everlasting Father” is written as a single word, and “Prince of Peace” uses maqqeph. The disjunctive accentuation on “wonderful” is no doubt the reason that the older translations distinguish the words.

With the help of Bible Works, we can gain further insight into the reason for the disjunction. Let’s search for all instances of two successive nouns in which the first bears the accent telisha gedolah. After selecting the WTM text as our search version and enabling searching on Hebrew accents, the appropriate search string is

‘*@n* *@n*+*Zj*

This search returns fifty verses. As we study them, we find that most of the instances of this accent are used in one or both of two settings.

First, thirteen cases use the accent in the middle of a long list of names. For example, Neh 7:7 lists some prominent people who came with Zerubbabel from Babylon to rebuild Jerusalem: “Jeshua, Nehemiah, Azariah, Raamiah, Nahamani, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispereth, Bigvai, Nehum, Baanah.” The name “Azariah” is marked with Telisha Gedolah.

The second major use (about 23 instances) is to mark a noun (or the last noun in a phrase) that is amplified by apposition. A good example is Deut 7:13,  “the fruit of thy land, thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.” Corn, wine, and oil explain further what Moses means by “the fruit of thy land.”

Of particular relevance to Isa 9:5 are those cases that combine these two uses. That is, the word marked with the accent is a proper name (as in the first category), but it is the first name in a list, and the following names are meant to define it in more detail. Here are some examples.

• 1 Sam 1:1 his name was Elkanah, the son of Jeroham, the son of Elihu, the son of Tohu, the son of Zuph, an Ephrathite:
• 1 Kings 15:18 and king Asa sent them to Benhadad, the son of Tabrimon, the son of Hezion, king of Syria, that dwelt at Damascus,
• 2 Kings 16:7 Tiglath pileser king of Assyria
• Isaiah 7:1 And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah

This idiom strongly suggests that in addition to reading five names instead of four, we should understand the first as a summary of the others. The name of the Child is “Wonder,” or “Miracle.” The other four names describe various ways in which he is a miracle.

The exposition of these verses on Feb 22, in the will of the Lord, will work out the details of this insight.