[b-hebrew] Pausal forms

Vadim Cherny vadimcherny at gmail.com
Wed Aug 24 16:32:13 EDT 2011


On Aug 24, 2011, at 11:24 PM, Petr Tomasek wrote:

>
>  Bezalel Elan Dresher. "The Prosodic Basis of the Tiberian Hebrew  
> System of Accents". Language 70 (1994). s. 1-52.  ?

Prosody is too broad an explanation for the Masoretic marks. Prosody  
alone, for example, cannot explain five vowel quantities - they simply  
do not exist in speech, but only in singing.

> The "liturgical chant" of a Biblical text was actually only a  
> ritualized
> form of learning/teaching towards a broader public.
>

I doubt that on historical grounds. There was no concept of learning  
Hebrew besides learning to chant the liturgical texts, not for the  
'broad public.'

Vadim Cherny


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