[GCFL-discuss] heilel

[Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies List]

Lance, I have a little more to offer on Lucifer, having got some
perspective from the rabbi I mentioned. The quote from the New Testament
you pointed to is obviously a reference by Jesus to Isaiah 14:12. That
verse is itself often cited as authority for the rebellion of a portion
of the angels against G-d. I am informed that the original Hebrew for
that verse, from the scroll of the prophet whose name when he lived was
Yishayahu is "Eich nafalta mi-shamayim, heilel ben shachar; nigdata
la-aretz, cholesh al goyim." That is a transliteration into syllables,
spelled out in Roman letters, which gives a good approximation of how the
text in Hebrew letters might be read.

The translation into English would be ""How you have fallen from the sky,
bright one son of dawn; you have been cut down to the earth, dominator of
nations."

Translating heilel into Latin, lucifer is not a bad equivalent, since it
comes from the Latin words lux (root luci=), "light" and ferre "to bear."
So it means "light-bearer." But it does not refer to Satan. It is a
prophecy of the fall of Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon.

Of course people could, and will, continue to argue the significance of
that verse. What this all means to me is that the Bibles most of us read
are worth reading because they are the closest we are going to get to the
Word of G-d, but, they are not what some churches call "the complete and
perfect Word of G-d." Why not? Because none of them are in the original
language of the revelations recorded, and, as far as the New Testament
goes, the original revelations were not even written down. A lot can get
lost in translation, and then a lot more can be created from what a
translation seems to contain, that were not in the original.

For the Old Testament, the oldest available texts in Hebrew seem to me
the most accurate source for understanding what was said. For the New
Testament, what we actually have are Greek texts possibly derived from
Aramaic texts that we no longer have, or possibly written with the best
intentions by Christian writers long after the crucifixion. The broad
flow of whole chapters, or entire books, is more important than the
details of each verse.

Of course, I could be wrong, but so could the most gifted teachers. Which
leaves each of us to come to terms with what we can really see and follow
in our own reading.

Siarlys
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