There are Hebrew word plays in 2 Kings 1 that are not apparent in English translations but are part of the original narrator’s intention, not without a touch of humor, to show that the Israelite prophet Elijah out-Baals Baal. Dr. Andrew Burlingame is a Wheaton College Classical Languages program alumnus and is now Assistant Professor of Hebrew at the same. He specializes in Northwest Semitic languages, including Hebrew, Aramaic, Phoenician, and Ugaritic, along with their history and texts. His recent publications are featured here.
Andrew Burlingame is Assistant Professor of Hebrew at Wheaton College within the Department of Modern and Classical Languages. He has authored several articles, one of which received the 2018 Sean W. Dever Memorial Prize of the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem. He observes that until now we have had to guess at the meaning of a rare Hebrew word translated as “bowed down” in 1 Kings 18:42. Recent scholarship devoted to cognate languages has led some to believe that Elijah was actually making a rumbling sound, imitative of thunder.
“Exegetically Speaking” is a weekly podcast of the friends and faculty of Wheaton College, IL and The Lanier Theological Library. Hosted by Dr. David Capes, it features language experts who discuss the importance of learning the biblical languages—Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek—and show how reading the Bible in the original languages “pays off.” Each podcast lasts between seven and eleven minutes and covers a different topic for those who want to read the Bible for all it is worth.
A Word in Edgewise 
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