User talk:Billhattalmiyd

Before you try to answer a question, you need to understand the question. So let me help you.

Anyone who can read ought to know that my question only concerned kohen. It did not ask about qrbh or any of its derivatives. Within the question was Aelfric as a terminus a quo, simply because I know that, where kohen would be the background lexeme historically, he has in his age's English 'sacerd', transliterated from Latin sacerdos -otis. Luther's 'Priester', which would be based on substituting in some interim version the church's 'old man' for the Israelite ritualist, was simply my terminus ad quem.

The purpose of my question had been and still is to pinpoint the introduction of a gimmick that has caused boundless confusion, so that religionists of churchdom argue over "the priesthood of all believers," which could either mean that all believers are ritualists of some kind or that all believers are old men. The latter, of course, would be utter nonsense, but the confounding that was done succeeded in convincing multitudes of a surreal ecclesiastical egalitarianism.

A kohen may be of any age, from little Samuel on up.

Do you think that I have not read the etymological speculations on kohen? Forms from the root qrbh Certain French versions certainly do better by putting 'sacrificateur' than the English do by sustituting a lexeme that historically means 'old man'. (I would put 'elder', which is really the same as 'older' or 'alder-' as in 'alderman', but presbyteros even in LXX and so-called NT is hardly, if ever, a true comparative.)

Can anyone who can read well enough to understand my question answer it?

The question may be rephrased thus: When, between Aelfric and Luther, did someone first translate Hebrew kohen > Greek iepuc = hiereus > Latin sacerdos into English, as [if it were] a derivative of Hebrew zaqen > Greek npecbutepoc = presbyteros > Latin senior / senex / presbyterus etc.?

I realize that 'first' introduces a historical negative, i.e. the assumption that there lurks no unknown predecessor, and therefore needs to be understood as optimal, not as an absolute.

Please read the question, and do not try to treat of this by flinging at me inapplicable citations from Strong's, Young's, some numbered interlinear, or any other sophomoric folderol. For years almost any seminary prof you can name has looked like an amateur or a dilletante. Thanks.

Billhattalmiyd (talk) 11:06, 18 January 2009 (UTC)