Exodus 32:1 - On the noun אִישׁ

(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation, an adaptation of the NJPS translation. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term אִישׁ, by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)

This instance has a doublet in v. 23. In both cases, the situating noun אִישׁ performs one of its typical discourse functions. It marks essential information about a key participant in the situation of interest—data that the speaker considers crucial for grasping the situation. It is a prototypical usage: it relates its referent to the situation.

(Clearly אִישׁ is not being used to inform Aaron that Moses is an “adult male.” As with most biblical usages of this noun, it is barely meaningful on the information level. Rather, it is most meaningful on the discourse level—that is, in organizing the communication between the speaker and his audience, Aaron.)

Grammatically speaking, the noun phrase that is headed by אִישׁ is placed in (non-restrictive) apposition to the name Moses, so it is co-referential with that name.

Semantically speaking, some interpreters seem to say that this אִישׁ-headed apposition serves to identify the intended referent, as if the speaker needed to specify which Moses they have in mind—or as if Aaron would not otherwise know his own brother. Such construals do not yield an informative statement. Rather, we should understand the speaker to be specifying which particular attribute of Moses is profiled as salient. In effect: “Moses—as you know, the man who.…” See further Robert D. Holmstedt and Andrew R. Jones, “Apposition in Biblical Hebrew: Structure and Function,” KUSATU: Kleine Untersuchungen zur Sprache des Alten Testaments und seiner Umwelt 22 (2017): 21–51, esp. 32, 35–38.

The speaker mentions this attribute in order to indicate that what “the people” most miss about Moses is his role as the nation’s guide. They feel lost without him. As Ramban wrote, those who have approached Aaron are now seeking another Moses, not another God.

In short, this אִישׁ-headed noun phrase functions grammatically as a label, while it functions semantically as a characterization.

In contrast, a view that is decidedly not the plain-sense meaning of אִישׁ in this passage appears in The Jewish Study Bible (2014, ad loc.). There, Jeff Tigay explains that the people refer to Moses with the term אִישׁ ‘man’ as a matter of contrast with the category of deity: “In the people’s view, Moses disappeared because he was a mortal; that is why they want a ‘god’ to replace him.” Rather, אִישׁ is being used in a much more conventional way, to mark the salient characterizing information about him; his mortality is not at all at issue.

As for rendering into English, the NJPS “that man Moses, who brought us from the land of Egypt” conflates the meaning contribution of the demonstrative pronoun זֶה with the situating noun אִישׁ. It treats אִישׁ as if it were signaling Moses’ essential place in the situation under discussion, when in fact it marks specifying information about him.

The revised rendering better conveys the discourse function of אִישׁ in this utterance.