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Genesis 3:7

And they are being opened, the eyes of the both of themselves, and they are perceiving that he was shrewd with them, themselves.117 And they are sewing together a leaf of a fig, and they are making to-themselves belts.118

Footnote:

117

He Deceived Themselves

Hebrew וידעו כי עירמם הם

Firstly, notice that עירמם irmam is different from ערומים arumim "naked ones" which was just used in Genesis 2:25. 

What could it be?

Scholars add in the letter י to make it a plural "naked ones" עירמים irrumim in their interpretations but the reading can't be changed, because irrumim is not the same as arumim. Furthermore, this does not follow the usual pattern of word constructs that end with two letter mems מם. The ending מם occurs around 240 times in the Hebrew scriptures and is usually the third person plural suffix as in ירומם "he is exalting them" (Hosea 11:7) or תקומם "he is standing them up" (Isaiah 58:12) or adverbial. It is exceedingly rare that two mems are meant to be a plural suffix with the י yod dropped.

The phrase כי עירמם הם is not simple to decipher, especially when obscured by so much muck. The construct עירמם irmam doesn't occur anywhere else in the scriptures, but its components do. Traditionally it is taken for an "irregular" form of ערום arum the masculine for "naked," similar to the more common feminine ערוה arvah "nakedness." These stem from the root ערה arah (Strong's #6168). Because there is no "yod" in the proper spelling of these words, it makes it all the more difficult. The addition of the letter י would create a rare form only found in a few places.

The noun עיר is a masculine noun and also means "city". The plural form of cities is the contracted ערים irim in which the first letter yod is dropped, but we know that in this case, the letter י is not being added. Hence one valid interpretation could be "their cities." But this does not create any cohesive context.

The word "city" itself is derived from from the root עור (Strong's #5782) meaning "to awaken, arouse." But the two מ letters don't fit here either and thus "he awakened them" isn't quite accurate.

This leads us to the verb root ערם to be shrewd, crafty (Strong's #6191) the only verb that actually matches:

"And they, themselves knew that he had deceived them" or "And they, themselves knew that he was crafty with themselves."

Breakdown:

  • ו (v') – "And"
  • ידעו (yadu) – "They knew" (third-person plural, past tense of ידע "to know").
  • כי (ki) – "That" (introduces a reason or a cause).
  • עירמם (irmam) – From the root ערם, meaning "to deceive" or "to cause craftiness." In this form (Piel conjugation, third-person masculine singular), it would mean "he deceived them."
  • הם (hem) – "They" (refers to the group that was deceived or made crafty).

Psalm 83:3 contains a Hiphil causative imperfect form of this verb:

"על עמך יערימו סוד ויתיעצו על צפוניך"

"Against the people of yourself they are scheming/craftily plotting [יערימו] a secret counsel..."

(Psalm 83:3 RBT)

The Hiphil causative would be ערימ and the Piel עירמם the yod placed for vocalization, a weak first gutteral verb. See Gesenius Verbs with Gutterals. 

The word "תפקחנה" (tipkakhnah) is the third person plural feminine form of the verb "פקח" (paqach), meaning "to open." It can be "they are opening" or "they are being opened." The feminine plural verb construct is the same for all the strong incomplete verb forms except the reflexive: 

 

Additionally, we also find that עיר means "young male donkey" (Strong's #5895). The similarity between these three words could certainly cause a lot of confusion. The plural for "young colts/donkeys" can be either עירים or עירם (cf. Genesis 32:15) thus the plural of עירם with the possesive suffix ם- "their young colts/donkeys" can also be valid translation, however, the context clearly doesn't accommodate this meaning.