| 7. Linguistic Exegesis The verse is composed of two balanced rhetorical questions, each beginning with a prepositional phrase and followed by the same verb, creating tight parallelism that exposes the inconsistency of “defending” God through wrongdoing. The opening halel {הַ֭לְאֵל | hălʾēl} places the lamed-preposition before the divine title, and the attached interrogative particle turns it into a pointed challenge: “Is it for God…?” The repeated tĕdabbĕrû {תְּדַבְּר֣וּ | tĕdabbĕrû} / tĕdabbĕrû {תְּֽדַבְּר֥וּ | tĕdabbĕrû} binds the clauses together and focuses the accusation on their speech as an intentional act. The nouns ʿawlāh {עַוְלָ֑ה | ʿawlāh} ‘injustice’ and rəmiyyāh {רְמִיָּֽה | rəmiyyāh} ‘deceit’ are placed at the end of each question for emphasis, functioning as the climactic objects of what they are “speaking.” The shift from halel {הַ֭לְאֵל | hălʾēl} to velo {וְ֝ל֗וֹ | wəlô} keeps the same “for/on behalf of” relationship while replacing the divine title with a pronominal reference, sustaining the charge that their advocacy is fundamentally misdirected: they attempt to justify God with morally corrupt speech. English preserves the double-question structure to retain the accusatory cadence and the parallel force. |