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5. “Do you not know that the wicked shall not
inherit the kingdom of God? Be not misled; neither the immoral (Prostitutes) nor idolaters nor adulterers
nor the corrupt, nor [men] who lie with males...” (1 Corinthians 6:9 Lamsa). Dr. Lamsa translated the Aramaic word m'khab-le (plural)
as "the corrupt" here. This is an acceptable interpretation since this is the meaning
of m’khab-le when the Aramaic text literally described
Israel as “corrupt children” (Isaiah 1:4). M’khab-la (singular) also means “corrupt” at Titus 2:8, which says: “who is honourable and not
corrupt; and don’t let a man despise him, that he who stands against us may be ashamed when he will not be able
to speak against us any hateful thing.”
Additionally, m'khab-le (plural) has a more common
and obvious meaning that is more in line with its verb root. M’khab-le also means
“destroyers.” M’khab-le occurs in the construct form in the Song
of Solomon at 2:15. That verse says that the little foxes were the destroyers of the vineyards (literal
translation). M’khab-le is pronounced as m’khab-lay at the afor mentioned verse because the sentence needed the word “of” between “the
destroyers” and “the vineyards.” For this verse, m’khab-le
has a dual meaning of “destroyers” and “spoilers.” Dr. Lamsa translated this verse as: “..the
little foxes that spoil the vineyards,..” M’khab-la (singular) appears
at Sira 21:3: “Falsehood is like the teeth of a lion, and a destroyer of the souls of men.” At Job 21:10, the Aramaic literally says this: “his bull breeds, and fails not; and
his calf calves and is not a destroyer (i.e. she does not miscarry).” M’khab-la-na (singular) is the spelling for “the destroyer”
when it is listed in a Dictionary or Lexicon. Very early in Aramaic grammar, some Aramaic words were spelled with a final
“a” sound for their indefinite form. For these masculine words,
they are made definite by adding a final na sound. These feminine
words added a final tha sound. Some of these words, like m’khablana, loose their final na sound when they follow the word la, which means neither, nor, not or does
not. This is just a grammatical rule and doesn’t necessarily make the word indefinite. The final na
sound also drops when it is in the construct form and the word “of” is needed before the next word. And lastly,
if the Aramaic word is used as an adjective, the final na sound drops.
Dr. Lamsa defined m’khab-la-na (singular) as “the destroyer” (Ex.
12:23, Prov. 18:9, 1 Cor. 10:10), “the avenger” (Isa. 54:16) and m’khab-la-ne (plural) as “the destroyers” (Jer. 22:7) in the Bible. There is no where in the Bible showing
that the word m’khab-la-ne means homosexuals. NOTE:
The root of m'khab-la-na is Khwa-la, which means: “to harm, destroy, writhe, etc.” The Aramaic letter beth, has a "b" and a "w" sound. The Aramaic word
khwa-la is the same as the Hebrew word kha-val (Or Strong’s pronunciation: kha-bal, #2256).
Kha-bal has the same meanings of khwa-la that I have
seen in the Aramaic Bible.
The Aramaic pronunciation of shach-bay am dich-re is translated as [men] who lie with males (Lamsa). Dr. Lamsa
adds the word men in our English translation. The Aramaic text says: “those who commit rape with a
man.” A plural of men lying with one man sounds like gang rape to me; which the Bible gives examples of, as in
the story of Sodom and the men of Gibeah. That is why I translated the word shcaw,
which is the same as the Hebrew word sha-cav (Strong’s # 7901), as “rape.” The Hebrew word sha-cav was translated two ways in the Aramaic
Old Testament. Ninety-nine percent of the time, sha-cav was translated as dmik; which means “to lie down, sleep.” Dmik can also mean
“to lie with” when the word “with” is added after it. When sha-cav
was translated as schaw in the Aramaic, the context is referring to rape and perhaps death
(see Gen. 35:22). At least mostly, shcaw means “rape” throughout the Bible
when used in the sexual sense.
Most Aramaic nouns are spelled the same in their
plural and singular form. Plural or singular pronouns attached to the verb will let the reader know if the noun is plural
or singular. When the word “of” is used between a verbal noun and another noun, the Aramaic language has two forms
for the verbal noun to let the reader know if the second noun is plural or singular. If the Aramaic language didn’t
have this, then there would be no way to know if the second noun is plural or singular; since a verb with an attached pronoun
would not follow the noun.
In the above example, the Aramaic literally says:
“rapers of a man (dich-ra).” Since the form that the verbal noun is
in indicates that the second noun is singular, then it is wrong for Dr. Lamsa to translate the Aramaic word as “males”
(dich-re). When the verbal noun is plural and the second noun is plural, then the verbal
noun will have an additional “m” sound at the beginning of the verb root,
as in’ “the destroyers of (m'khab-lay) the
vineyards.” The form that this verbal noun is in indicates that the second noun is plural.
The following are some examples of the same verbal
noun form used in 1 Corinthians 6:9. In some of the examples I left the word “of” out. Revelation 17:8
says: “inhabitants (pl.) upon the earth (sing.).” Revelation 18:17
says: “all the passengers (pl.) in the ship (sing.).” Revelation 19:5
says: “worshippers (pl.) of His Name (sing.).” Additionally, there are some examples
with this verbal noun form in which the second noun sounds like it should be plural to an English speaker, but it is not.
We know this because at Revelation 22:15, the Greek text has the second noun in the singular form as in: “makers
(pl.) of a lie (sing.).” And at Job 13:4, the phrase says: “speakers (pl.)
of a lie (sing.).” We know that the word “lie” is singular because the original Hebrew
text has the word “lie” in the singular form.
Additionally, there are a few occurrences where this
verbal noun form used here at First Corinthians will have the following noun pointed (voweled) as being plural. These
errors occur frequently in the Aramaic Old Testament Translation and in Dr. Lamsa’s Translation. The Aramaic Old Testament
is very often a literal translation of the Hebrew and doesn’t always have the additional grammar needed to let the reader
know if the noun is singular or plural. Dr. Lamsa many times translated a noun plural when the Hebrew noun is singular and
vice versa. Since the Aramaic Old Testament is a translation of the Hebrew, then the Aramaic noun is singular when the Hebrew
noun is singular and plural when the Hebrew noun is plural (in most cases). I haven’t come across this problem in the
Aramaic New Testament, which was originally written in Aramaic and is very precise. Though I do have to say that I may not
agree with how a noun is pointed (voweled) and translated as in this example at First Corinthians 6:9. I can’t say that I am convinced that the second noun should ever be plural
when this verbal noun form is used, but there are a few occurrences where the second noun is pointed plural. If there is any
merit to this, then this form should first be seen as indicating that the following noun is singular, as in its overwhelming
usage in scripture. Native Aramaic speakers and those educated in Aramaic would then know when the following noun should be
interpreted in the plural in certain phrases.
I still hold that the Aramaic says “those
who commit rape with a man” because the phrase has a middle word “with” between the verbal
noun and the following noun, making this phrase literally say: “rapers with a man.” Every other
place in the Bible where this verbal noun form has a middle word, the verbal noun is plural while the following noun is singular.
I gave two examples of this above. The word “with” doesn’t need to
be translated into English for this phrase. That phrase can be translated as “those who rape a man.” The Aramaic language mostly contains
the word “with” (am) in most of the places that English speakers
use the word; but there are a few places where the Aramaic language uses the word “with” where English
speakers would not use it in a phrase.
The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Shcaw –
to rape (Galilean Aramaic), kill (Jewish Babylonian)
Is the Bible Against Homosexuality?
by Mattai "the Preacher" © 2003-2009. All rights reserved.
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