This is an old revision of the document!
sehit
שהית
'sehit' appears to refer to a state of ruin. However, its exact meaning is not entirely clear due to the way it is used in sometimes opposing ways.
A good example of this occurs in Genesis chapter 6 where the word is used five times.
And was corrupt the earth before God and was filled with the earth violence. So looked God - upon the earth and indeed it was corrupt for had corrupted all flesh their way on the earth. And said God to Noah the end of all flesh has come before Me for is filled the earth with violence through them now behold I will destroy them with the earth1) … And I behold am bringing - a flood of waters on the earth to destroy all flesh which the breath of life from under heaven everything that [is] on the earth shall die2)
The bolded words here are all the same word; 'sehit'. In order to hold true to the original text, we need to find an English word that makes sense in all of these five instances. There are a few obvious logical problems with this.
If we choose to interpret 'sehit' as “corrupt” then the narrative tells that the earth was corrupt, causing God to desire to do something to remedy the situation. However, the action he chooses is “to corrupt”. This seems somewhat at odds with the assumed characteristics of the holy God. Beyond that though, if the problem was corruption, how will further corruption improve the situation? Additionally, if the existing state already applies, it does not make sense to speak of applying the same state.