The ''pluralis excellentiae'' is the name given by early grammarians of Hebrew, such as

Wilhelm Gesenius Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius (3 February 178623 October 1842) was a German orientalist, lexicographer, Christian Hebraist, Lutheran theologian, Biblical scholar and critic. Biography Gesenius was born at Nordhausen. In 1803 he bec ...

, to a perceived anomaly in the grammatical number and syntax in Hebrew. In some cases it bears some similarity to the ' or "royal plural". However, the idea of excellence is not necessarily present: Hebrew distinguishes grammatical number by endings in nouns, verbs and adjectives. A grammatical phenomenon occurs with a small number of Hebrew nouns, such as ''

elohim ''Elohim'' ( ) is a Hebrew word meaning "gods" or "godhood". Although the word is plural in form, in the Hebrew Bible it most often takes singular verbal or pronominal agreement and refers to a single deity, particularly but not always the Go ...

'' 'great god' and ''

behemoth Behemoth (; , ''bəhēmōṯ'') is a beast from the biblical Book of Job, and is a form of the primeval chaos-monster created by God at the beginning of creation. Metaphorically, the name has come to be used for any extremely large or powerful ...

'' 'giant beast', whereby a grammatically redundant plural ending (''-im'', usually masculine plural, or ''-oth'', usually feminine plural) is attached to a noun, but the noun nevertheless continues to take singular verbs and adjectives.

Abstract plurals with feminine singular

Abstract plurals with ''-im'' endings such as in words for 'uprightness', 'blessedness', 'sweetness', 'youth', 'strength', etc. take feminine singular verbs and adjectives.

Behemoth—beasts or great beast

Sometimes the normal plural of a noun and the intensive plural are the same. For example ''behem'', 'beast' singular, conjugates with the common feminine plural ''-oth'', and ''behemoth'' + plural verb in, for example, the

Genesis Genesis may refer to: Religion * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of humankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Bo ...

account of Noah's Ark indicates 'beasts' plural. But in the

Book of Job The Book of Job (), or simply Job, is a book found in the Ketuvim ("Writings") section of the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Poetic Books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The language of the Book of Job, combining post-Babylonia ...

''behemoth'' + singular verb indicates 'giant beast', i.e. the sense of ''

'' in English. ''

Leviathan Leviathan ( ; ; ) is a sea serpent demon noted in theology and mythology. It is referenced in several books of the Hebrew Bible, including Psalms, the Book of Job, the Book of Isaiah, and the pseudepigraphical Book of Enoch. Leviathan is of ...

'' is also intensive: "You crushed the heads of Leviathan. You gave it as food for people, for beasts".

Intensive plurals with masculine or feminine singular

An adjective qualifying a noun in the plural of excellence is more often found in the singular than in the plural. Examples of the singular include * Deuteronomy 5:23 * 1 Samuel 17:26, 36 * 2 Kings 19:4, 16 ''Elohim hay'' 'living God'. * Psalm 7:10 "a just God" * Isaiah 19:4 ''adonim qaseh'' 'a hard master' * Isaiah 37:4, 17 * Jeremiah 10:10, 23:36

Objections

Against this are objections such as that of the Hebrew grammarian and Messianic Jewish missionary

C. W. H. Pauli Zebi Nasi Hirsch Prinz (Hebrew Tzvi Nassi) in German Heinrich Prinz, and later Rev. Christian William Henry Pauli (11 August 1800, in Breslau – 4 May 1877, in Amsterdam) was a convert to Christianity, missionary for the London Jewish mission, an ...

(1863) that Gesenius had misunderstood the grammar and perpetuated a hoax. Pauli writes, "Such a ''pluralis excellentiæ'' was, however, a thing unknown to Moses and the prophets. . . . kings throughout ת״ב״ד, (the Law, the Prophets. and the Hagiographa) speak in the singular, and not as modern kings in the plural. They do not say ''we,'' but I, command; as in Gen xli. 41 ; Dan. iii. 29 ; Ezra i. 2, etc., etc."

Other correspondence of number in Hebrew

Singular nouns may also take plural adjectives.

Related grammatical constructs

Distinct from the apparent "plural" of nouns with singular verbs is the "plural of deliberation", for "Let us make man in our own image". Steven L. Bridge; ''Getting the Old Testament: What It Meant to Them'', 2009: "Scholars advance two possibilities. One is that the plural is appropriate given the self-reflective tone of the passage. This grammatical construction is called a 'plural of deliberation.' Similar examples can be found in Gen 11:7–8, Isa 6:8 ...". The plural is usually identified by a -''im, -ot,'' or -''ei'' ending.

References

{{reflist Grammatical number Hebrew grammar de:Pluralis excellentiae