and it/he separated the water below the cupola and the water above the cupola.
וַיַּבְדֵּ֗ל בֵּ֤ין הַמַּ֙יִם֙ אֲשֶׁר֙ מִתַּ֣חַת לָרָקִ֔יעַ וּבֵ֣ין הַמַּ֔יִם אֲשֶׁ֖ר מֵעַ֣ל לָרָקִ֑יעַ
As we saw when we looked at the words ר֣וּחַ אֱלֹהִ֔ים in v. 2, translators sometimes must make a choice that eliminates some of the richness of the original Hebrew. That means it’s time for some more grammar.
Gender doesn’t play any role in the English verbal system, but we do have some gendered pronouns: he/him for males, she/her for females, and it for things that don’t have gender. Perhaps because we use the same verbs for all, the pronouns can be, and have been, used quite loosely. A ship can be a “she,” and a pet can be an “it.” Male and female refer to sex, but the grammatical terms are masculine, feminine, and neuter.
We need to be thinking about this now because Hebrew does not have a neuter gender. Every noun in Hebrew is either masculine or feminine. (An extremely well-done book that discusses this topic among many others is Guy Deutscher’s Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages.)
All of that is to explain the words “it/he” in my translation of Gen 1:7.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Bible Guy to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.