Note 680 — Chapter XVIII
Reading edition
הֲלאֹ כָמֹהוּ כְאַיִן בְּעֵינֵיכֶם. Literally, is not the like of it as nothing in your eyes? But that can hardly be the meaning. It might be equivalent to is it not, as it stands, as nothing in your eyes? But the fact is that in Hebrew construction of a simple, unemphasised comparison, the comparing particle כ stands before both objects compared: as, for instance, in the phrase (Gen. xliv. 18) כִּי כָמוֹךָ כְּפַרְעֹה, thou art as Pharaoh.