עוגת רצפים

מאת: אבנר רמו

In the Book of Job we read: כי-אדם לעמל יולד; ובני-רשף יגביהו עוף - “But man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward” (Job 5:7).

Yet in the Book of Isaiah we find: ויעף אלי אחד מן-השרפים - “Then flew to me one of the seraphim” (Is 6:6; see also Is 6:2).

However, the comparison between these verses suggests that שרפים (seraphim) is an order-type error of רשפים (reshaphim) - “[the sons of] sparks. However, it is also possible that
בני-רשף (benei-resheph) is a metathesis of בני-שרף (benei-sereph).

Although the exact nature of the שרפים (seraphim) is not clear, their description in Isaiah 6:1-4 suggests that they had supernatural features. In the Book of Kings we read about the journey of the Prophet Elijah in the wilderness where he was awaken of his sleep by YHWH’s messenger and found: עגת רצפים - “a cake baked on the hot stones” (1 Ki 19:6). This was a cake with supernatural powers as:
וילך בכח האכילה ההיא, ארבעים יום וארבעים לילה
“and [he] went in the strength of that meal forty days and forty nights” (1 Ki 19:8).

It is therefore suggested that the supernatural עגת רצפים (u’gath retsaphim) is a misspelled
עגת שרפים (u’gath seraphim) - “a cake of seraphim.” This suggestion assumes that in addition to the interchange between the sibilants ש (s) and צ (ts), a metathesis also occurred here.