| 27. Linguistic Exegesis The verse is a tight Hebrew poetic bicola built on parallel clauses: yegallu shamayim avono {יְגַלּוּ שָׁמַיִם עֲוֺנ֑וֹ | yəgallû šāmayim ʿăwōnô} ‘the heavens will reveal his iniquity’ followed by veeretz mitqomamah lo {וְאֶרֶץ מִתְקוֹמָמָה לֽוֹ | wəʾereṣ mitqōmāmāh lô} ‘and the earth will rise up to him.’ The initial verb-first ordering foregrounds the inevitability of exposure, then the subjects “heavens” and “earth” form a merism that encompasses the whole created order as a courtroom-like witness against the wicked. The lamed phrase lo {לוֹ | lô} ‘to him’ is naturally rendered “against him” because the rising of the earth is adversative within the parallelism and the judicial imagery of accusation. The English keeps the matched verbs (“expose / rise up”) to preserve the force of the parallel lines and the cosmic testimony motif. |