Vayavdel

Grammar

Word: ויבדל or יבדל
Representation: YBDL
Transliteration: Yavdel
Verb: "he caused a separation/division", or "he divided/separated", or "he will separate" (without the vav prefix).
Strong Concordance: H914

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Exposition

The piel form of the word "to separate" is לבדל. The form expressed here is past-tense. It only occurs 4 times in Scripture with the prefixing "vav" (past tense), and one time without it (future tense).

This is an active form that demands intervention. This is an act that does not just happen, but an outside source causes it to occur. One example is the Elohim separating the light from the darkness, which would require an action on their part to make it occur. One may consider this to be a physical interaction or a metaphysical one, depending on one's ideology.

In either case, the meaning is to cause one thing to remain apart, separate, divided, from another thing.

Only in Genesis is this term use with "between", which infers boundaries of the two objects.There is an ideological reason for that this is discussed in a different post [click here].

Ki Tov

Grammar

Word: כי טוב
Representation: KY TVB
Transliteration: Ki Tov
Expression: "for good", "because of good", "that good"
Strong Concordance: H3588 and H2896

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Exposition

This is one of the few times where a pair of words cannot be separated. This is because it is an expression that appears more then 40 times in Scripture.

Because of it's ambiguous meaning that seems to change with every translation, it has lent itself to being a catch-all phrase for something that basically means "satisfied" or "more than acceptable".

For example, when it says that the Elohim "saw the light "ki tov" and then separated the light from the darkness", you end up with such comments as:

1. The light was good, so the darkness was not good.
2. THAT light was good, but not all light is good
3. That light is only for the good [people] and it was set aside for the "world to come".
4. God can only see good, and so he saw it because it was good.

The list goes on.

The simple meaning is "God made light, examined it, was satisfied with His creation (it was more than just acceptable), and separated it from the darkness".

But because of people expectation, I will often use "that was good" alone or with another modifier/

Lirote

Grammar

Word: ירא or וירא
Representation: YRA
Transliteration: Yereh
Verb: "he saw", or "and he saw"
Strong Concordance: H7200

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Exposition

The simple infinitive form of the word "to see" is לראות. The form expressed here is past-tense third-person if it begins with a "vav" ("and"), and future tense third-person if it does not. It's a form of Biblical Hebrew grammar that is no longer used. (The technique is known as "vav-conversive").

This word occurs more than 300 times in Scripture and often, with different effects.

Depending on the context, it can also mean "examined", "perceived", "noticed", "understood". That has to be applied correctly. For example, if it is a passive seeing, then "saw" is certainly appropriate. If there is a directed (active) looking implied, then "examined" might be the best word to use.

One example is when God creates something - does He just see it passively, or is He examining His creation? Because of this, I may sometimes use an expression that differs from the more traditional use. But if you prefer "saw", then by all means, do so.

vayihi

Grammar

Word: ויהי
Representation: VYHY
Transliteration: Yayehi
Verb: "and it/he was"
Strong Concordance: H1961

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Exposition

This is a vav-conversive form of the verb, reversing the future-tense single-person form of the verb "to be" to the past-tense form, or "he/it was". Vav-conversive is a Biblical style that it not normally used in modern Hebrew. 

Because Hebrew is gender-based (there is no "it", just "he" or "she"), this word can either be translated as "it was" or "he was". The prefixing vav can either be translated or dropped, depending on the style and context. I typically use "and" unless another preposition helps the sentence flow better.

All vav-conversive past forms in Tanach:

ויהי - And he was

ואהיה - I will be (the KJV mangles this to "I AM")

ויהיו - They will be

ותהיו - You (plural) will be

ותהיי - You (fem.) will be

yehi

Grammar

Word: יהי
Representation: YHY
Transliteration: Yehi
Verb: "it/he/there will be"
Strong Concordance: H1961

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Exposition

This is a future-tense single-person form of the verb "to be". It can either be translated as "it will be" or "he will be" due to the gender-based Hebrew language where "it" can be a "he" or a "she". Sometimes I may use "there will be" as a better sounding form of "it will be".

If prefixed by the letter vav (ו) that has a patach (it looks like a small "T") beneath the vav, the combination creates what is called a "vav-conversive" and the tense is reversed, and so "it will be" becomes "it was".

All future forms: 

יהי - He will be

תהיה - You (masc.)/she will be

אהיה - I will be (the KJV mangles this to "I AM")

יהיו - They will be

תהיו - You (plural) will be

תהיי - You (fem.) will be

Aur

Grammar

Word: אור
Representation: AUR
Transliteration: Or
Noun: "light", "tangible-light", "illumination"
Strong Concordance: H216

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Exposition

Depending on the context, this can refer to light as in an expression of illumination, or it can refer to something more tangible, as in the Elohim making the sun and the moon from light (Genesis 1:16), or the primordial light that was separated from the primordial darkness (Genesis 1:4).

In other places, it is simply an expression of illumination, and so it should be understood as such.

For more about light and it's relationship to day and the sun, click here:

amar

Grammar

Word: אמר
Representation: AMR
Transliteration: Amar
Verb: "said", "answered"
Strong Concordance: H559

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Exposition

This is the past-tense masculine form of "to say". It is also a singular form, and because Hebrew is gender-based, "he-said" or "it said" is equally valid, and so should be translated appropriately based on the context of the verse.

Biblical Hebrew will also link collective nouns in the singular form, which is not normally done in modern Hebrew. And sometimes a plural form will be used against a singular noun.

This can be confusing at first, but should be considered a style rather than a grammatical error, or proof that the noun is either singular or plural.

Example of a singular noun with a plural verb: Genesis 11:3 "And man [singular] said [plural] to..

Example of plural noun with singular verb: Exodus 4:29: "And Moses and Aaron [he] went (singular)..."

And of course, every instance of the plural noun "Elohim" has a singular verb, as in "And the Elohim [he] said (singular).

This style has resulted in some interesting ideological views of the text.