Ten thousand words to say one thing: parallelism is the chief hallmark of ancient Hebrew verse. Cut to the quick, Hobbins.
Briefly now, how does parallelism work?
It works like a pair of eyes. For example:
קוֹל קוֹרֵא
בַּמִּדְבָּר פַּנּוּ
דֶּרֶךְ יְהוָה
יַשְּׁרוּ בָּעֲרָבָה
מְסִלָּה לֵאלֹהֵינוּ
The voice of one crying:
A In the range land prepare
the way of YHWH;
B make straight
in the wild
a highway for our God!
Isaiah 40:3
As David Clines noted, “the couplet does not mean B, even if B is more precise than A. It means (i) prepare Yahweh’s way in the sense of making straight a highway, and it means (ii) make straight the highway as an act of preparing a way for Yahweh, and it means both of these things concurrently.” In other words, the meaning of a “parallelistic couplet” does not reside in A or B, but in the whole couplet of A and B in which A is to be understood in light of its juxtaposition with B, and B with A.[1]
Like two eyes, A and B provide a right and left perspective. Used in tandem, they produce a stereoscopic or three dimensional image.
For an essay-length treatment of Isaiah 40:1-11, go here.
[1] “The Parallelism of Greater Precision: Notes from Isaiah 40 for a Theory of Hebrew Poetry,” in New Directions in Hebrew Poetry (ed. Elaine R. Follis; JSOTSup 40; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987) 77-100; repr. in David J. A. Clines, On the Way to the Postmodern: Old Testament Essays 1967-1988. Volume 1 (JSOTSup 292; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998) 314-36; available online at www.shef.ac.uk/bibs/DJACcurrres/Articles.html.
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