FAIL, I see...

[In the post below, quoted text paragraphs begin with ***.]

Just bought and finished Carson's Exegetical Fallacies. Been wanting this for a long time since I was certain that it would contain many fallacies...not the ones Carson identifies, but the ones he perpetrates. Let me caution readers about "bad medicine". I'm not imputing bad motives to Carson, but one of the fallacies he neglected to mention is the "Fallacy fallacy". This occurs when people identify something as a fallacy when in fact it is nothing of the sort. The Fallacy fallacy is often a permutation of several of the fallacies Carson identifies, not the least being "The Cavalier Dismissal".

I have many issues with his various "examples" of certain fallacies, but I will note just a few. All are listed under "Root fallacies". This fallacy is the main fallacy which I expected him to err in elucidating. Let's pick up Carson in mid-rant:

*** All of this is linguistic nonsense. We might have guessed as much if we were more acquainted with the etymology of English words. Anthony C. Thiselton offers by way of example our word nice, which comes from the Latin nescius, meaning "ignorant." Our "good–bye" is a contraction for Anglo–Saxon "God be with you." Now it may be possible to trace out diachronically just how nescius generated "nice"; it is certainly easy to imagine how "God be with you" came to be contracted to "good–bye." But I know of no one today who in saying such and such a person is "nice" believes that he or she has in some measure labeled that person ignorant because the "root meaning" or "hidden meaning" or "literal meaning" of "nice" is "ignorant."

Wow, this is practically a twofer...two-for-one. So, for starters, I seriously doubt "good-bye" came from "God be with you". Sounds like an eggcorn to me. Ironically, I commented on a form of "good-bye" on a website dedicated to eggcorns just a couple of months ago, located here. Mine are the last two comments. In addition to what I say on the forum thread, I will add that "bye" essentially means "pass" or "permission to move along". We are familiar with the word as used in sports brackets--when a team gets to move to the next level without actually having to play another team they are said to get a "bye", i.e. they get to move along.

Regarding the word "nice", it is also rather ironic that I have used the word in the original root sense for years, even though I didn't realize it actually meant "ignorant" until I read Carson's comment above! In fact, I have even used the word in that sense on this very forum in the past, when I stated that the point of Christianity was not to be "nice", but rather to do what God says. For me, taking the syrupy nice approach at every opportunity may be perceived as "Christian", but nice-behaving people are often terribly wrong when it comes to fundamental Biblical issues. I promise you that God does not say, "Oh, that's okay! He's just so NICE!!"

0/2...not a good start. Maybe Carson can get out of trouble if he smacks a homerun!

Carson, in full stride, below tosses out these "unassailable" examples of root fallacies (it may seem that I have mixed my metaphors by putting Carson at bat and on the mound, but he is essentially swinging at his own pitches):

*** As Louw remarks, to derive the meaning of ὑπηρέτης (hypēretēs) from ὑπό (hypo) and ἐρέτης (eretēs) is no more intrinsically realistic than deriving the meaning of "butterfly" from "butter" and "fly," or the meaning of "pineapple" from "pine" and "apple." Even those of us who have never been to Hawaii recognize that pineapples are not a special kind of apple that grows on pines.

Well, of course not, D. A., but that isn't the intention in the name "pineapple". As such, your cavalier "straw man" dismissal, generated by erroneously stating and applying an obvious untruth, ignores the fact that there is an obvious reason for calling a pineapple a pineapple. A pineapple bears a remarkable resemblance to a pine cone. This conceptual connection is elucidated in the choice of the two root words that are purposefully compounded to form the word in view, pineapple--a fruit that looks like a pine cone. These two joined roots logically point to the designed intention of the word.

It is rather sad when your example of a fallacy is fallacious. Carson is 0/3...we could end here--but we would miss the fireworks!

Carson immediately rolls into this gem of "Fallacy fallacy" generation:

*** The search for hidden meanings bound up with etymologies becomes even more ludicrous when two words with entirely different meanings share the same etymology. James Barr draws attention to the pair [sic] לֶחֶס (leḥem) and מִלְחָמָה (milḥammâ), which mean "bread" and "war" respectively:

*** It must be regarded as doubtful whether the influence of their common root is of any importance semantically in classical Hebrew in the normal usage of the words. And it would be utterly fanciful to connect the two as mutually suggestive or evocative, as if battles were normally for the sake of bread or bread a necessary provision for battles. Words containing similar sound sequences may of course be deliberately juxtaposed for assonance, but this is a special case and separately recognizable.

[Attention: Let us ignore or annul Jdg. 8:4-6, since we wouldn't want to consider annulling Barr's sage words.]

We should first draw attention to the fact that Carson himself condemns as a fallacy the use of loaded language such as I have bolded above. He also eschews "simplistic appeals to authority". Barr is looked upon as almost a demi-god to many because of his book The Semantics of Bible Language. So Carson and Barr together get pinned with a Razzie for this error. Error??? Yes, believe it or not...error.

In the Etymological Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, Matityahu Clark identifies the  ל  ח  ם   root as meaning "struggle for existence". No doubt he has Gen. 3:17-19 in mind, particularly "by the sweat of your face you will eat bread', in addition to the idea of fighting enemies for survival. Very interesting. What is even more interesting is that the connection between the two root-sharing words Barr mentions is even more explicit than just that. But "explicit" apparently isn't sufficient for those (such as Vine, et. al. below) who, in the 'battle" against fallacies, feed (pun intended) on bursting "folk etymologies".

*** In folk etymology, lacham is often connected with lechem, the Hebrew term for “bread,” on the contention that wars are fought for bread. There is, however, no good basis for such etymology.      Vine, W. E., Unger, M. F., & White, W. (1996). Vine's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (1:81). Nashville: T. Nelson.

Interestingly, Matityahu Clark references Gen. 14:2 as an example of the root referring to "fighting". But what was the purpose of the attack of the kings of the east against the kings of the valley? Sorry, W. E., but Gen. 14:11 makes it rather clear: "they took all their food supply". Oooops! Awwwwkward!!

Mere coincidence? 2 Sam. 22:38-40 attests otherwise, where war entails consuming the enemy as food/bread. And what about Strong's entry?

3898 לָחַם, לָחַם [lacham /law·kham/] v. A primitive root; TWOT 1104, 1105; GK 4309 and 4310; 177 occurrences; AV translates as “fight” 149 times, “to war” 10 times, “make war” eight times, “eat” five times, “overcome” twice, “devoured” once, “ever” once, and “prevail” once. 1 to fight, do battle, make war. 1a (Qal) to fight, do battle. 1b (Niphal) to engage in battle, wage war. 2 (Qal) to eat, use as food.

Sure, some will assert (George, you out there?) that Strong is predictably submitting to the folk etymology and not drawing the necessary distinction that other better lexicons make plain with two separate entries. But are the other lexicons perhaps themselves submitting to the more recent but mistaken "wise one" assertions (such as Barr's and Vines's) that there is no semantic connection when indeed there is? After all, there is more to consider than just what I have presented so far...

In Prov. 4:17, bread is associated with wickedness and violence, with the intention of developing a "your are what you eat" understanding. With these traits imbibed, we can make greater sense out of James 4:1-2, were Jacob associates the source of wars and conflicts within the appetites of mankind. Taken with Gal. 5:15, we see the cummulative result of these two verses: violence imbibed as bread, leads to war comming from the heart of man, which is manifested in attempting to consume one another as though bread.

There is also Jer. 42:14, where war and bread are seen as interlinked.

Not enough? Then how about Exo. 15:3, 7. YHWH is a WARrior (Man of war) and as a result He consumes the enemy. When He isn't personally doing the heavy lifting Himself, He directs Israel to follow his example (Deut. 7:16), where "consuming" the peoples clearly entails warfare. In Jer. 10:25 the enemies of Israel devour and consume him, and in Psa. 53:4-5 the ones who "eat His people as bread" are "encamped" against them, where encamped can mean "to lay siege against". When do people lay siege against others? Ding, ding, ding!!! WHEN THEY ARE AT WAR WITH THEM!

Proof? Ezek. 21:21-22 introduces the King of Babylon as laying seige to Jerusalem; just a few verses later, in Ezek. 21:28-29, we see "a sword" that is  "consuming". Hmmmm. And since v. 29 mentions "false visions", let's give the prophets their due...

In view of Am. 7:11-12, where Amos (after giving a war related prophecy) is told to go eat bread and prophesy, we have Mic. 3:5, which is rather summative--if you don't put bread in my mouth, then I declare war. As good as that one is, though, I think this one is the coup de grace, or should I say the coup de lehhem? In Jdg. 7:13-14, a loaf of bread actually fights and wins the war!!

War consumes. Eating consumes. What is consumed is most often referred to as bread. These are all the same Hebrew root.

NO LOGICAL CONNECTION BETWEEN THE ROOTS of "bread" and "war"?? Quite the opposite...and the overwhelmingly ironic thing about Carson's and Barr's blunder is that if they had just bothered to perform one of the anathema and higly ridiculed "root studies" that has been mocked and derided so unmercifully (and I have heard root studies mocked on this forum, as well), then they wouldn't now have the egg of "Fallacy fallacy" all over their faces.

So beware. Carson's Exegetical Fallacies is not "without question" the medicine for what ails you. On the other hand, it is a very NICE book!