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  • From: Garth Grenache <garthgrenache AT hotmail.com>
  • To: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [b-hebrew] Yahweh and theophoric names
  • Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 03:54:40 +1100



Robert Shannon Sumner wrote> Please keep in mind that language is primarily a
spoken medium, and dialects differ from riverbank to riverbank. Grammar
comes along much later, and standardized grammar later still. To
attempt to use the late Massoretic ideas of how Hebrew should be written to
determine how a much earlier Hebrew would have been spoken is in and of
itself a faulty methodology.

I heed your warning to be cautious about presuming that Masoretic Hebrew
accurately reflects much earlier Hebrew, and encourage all to heed it.

The flip side of this coin is that another could have a faulty methodology if
they assumed that the changes between earlier Hebrew and Masoretic Hebrew
were not regular, and dismissed the Masoretic pointing as unhelpful, rather
than opting for an interpretation of that pointing which shows regular
correspondence with what is known/suggested about ancient Hebrew from other
sources.

For example, we can consider these regular correspondences between Masoretic
forms CōCeC and Semitic forms CuCCu:

'uẟnu ("ear") -noun
-> uznu (Akkadian)
-> 'udn (Ugaritic)
-> 'udun (Arabic)
-> 'ōzen (Hebrew)

shurshu ("root") -noun
-> shurshu (Akkadian)
-> shōresh (Hebrew)

qudshu ("holiness") -noun

-> qudshâ (Aramaic)

-> qōdesh (Hebrew)


There is clear suggestion here that a Proto-Semitic shape such as CuCCu
regularly becomes CōCeC in Masoretic Hebrew.  Therefore though Masoretic
pointing is doesn't point the earlier vowels, what it does point often has
regular correspondence to the earlier vowels.

If regular correspondence can be demonstrated in any aspect of the Masoretic
vowels, I suggest this aspect can be used as evidence.

Garth Grenache.

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