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  • From: JimStinehart AT aol.com
  • To: fournet.arnaud AT wanadoo.fr, George.Athas AT moore.edu.au, b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Eve and the Hivites
  • Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2010 09:36:37 EDT


The key linguistic issue on this thread is whether, in Hebrew, intervocalic
bet and intervocalic vav could at times be interchangeable, based on having
a similar, though not identical, pronunciation. If so, then Xeba in a
foreign language might be XWH/“Eve” in Hebrew, and people who worshipped Xeba
might well be called XWY/“Hivites” in Hebrew in chapter 34 of Genesis.

This phenomenon of Hebrew bet becoming Hebrew vav is well-attested in later
time periods:

“Taking an analysis from Mishnaic Hebrew, we see that words normally
written with the letter bet rapeh [soft B] are sometimes written with the
letter
waw. Kutscher takes this to mean that either {w} (the pronunciation he
assumes for waw) became {v} (the pronunciation he assumes for bet rapeh), or
vice
versa. One must then consider either the loss of phoneme /w/ and the
resulting phonemicization of /v/, or a restructuring of our understanding of
the
phoneme /b/. Either being difficult, it might be better to take the
perfectly logical view that bet rapeh was pronounced as a bilabial fricative,
{[fancy] B} [the sign for a voiced bilabial fricative, somewhat similar to
English V], and that the closest symbol to represent this was the letter waw,
making our phonological analysis much easier.” Walter Ray Bodine,
“Linguistics
and Biblical Hebrew” (1992), at p. 15.

“Spirantization of bet is evident in its interchange with waw or waw-waw,
as in the case of YWWNH and YBNH ‘Jabneh, Jamnia’ or )BYR and )WYR ‘air’.”
Miguel Perez Fernandez and John Elwolde, “An Introductory Grammar of
Rabbinic Hebrew” (1999), at p. 12.

“Both the consonants and vowels of PBH [post-biblical Hebrew] are identical
to those of BH [Biblical Hebrew]…. Spirantized bet and waw also merged at
times.” Baruch A Levine, in Steven L. McKenzie and John Kaltner, editors, “
Beyond Babel: A Handbook of Biblical Hebrew and Related Languages” (2002)
at p. 161.

“[In] Samaritan Hebrew…waw is labio-dental {v}, except in some defined
positions where it is still bi-labial, whether semi-vowel {w} or occlusive
{b}.”
Alan David Crown, Reinhard Pummer, and Abraham Tal, “A Companion to
Samaritan Studies” (1993), at p. 115.

And in what may possibly reflect an older time period:

“[In] inscriptions dating from around 1000 BCE to 200 BCE…the interchange
of waw and bet is, of course, attested, notably in the place name Jabneh.”
John F. Elwolde, in “The Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Ben Sira”
(1997), at pp. 20-21.

In the Middle Ages, regarding Karaite transcriptions of Biblical Hebrew:

“…ba is occasionally used to represent consonantal waw…. This attests to
the labiodental realization of consonantal waw….” Geoffrey Khan, in Joel
L. Kraemer, ed., “Israel Oriental Studies” (1992), at p. 168.

In modern times, this phenomenon is well-known as to pronunciation:

“[T]he weak bet is pronounced /v/ in Ashkenazic Hebrew….[and t]he waw is
[also] pronounced /v/ in Ashkenazic….” Miryam Segal, “A New Sound in Hebrew
Poetry” (2009), at p. 174.

But what was the case in early Biblical Hebrew as to these sounds, and as
to whether intervocalic B might be represented as intervocalic W in writing?
Could XWY in chapter 34 of Genesis be reflecting the name of the notorious
pagan goddess Xeba? The frequent scholarly claims that XWH/“Eve” likely
represents the name of the pagan goddess Xeba support that analysis.

Finally, because the Hivites/XWY are viewed negatively in the text, we
should consider the possibility that their Biblical name/nickname is
deliberately sub-standard. Based on the foregoing testimony from later time
periods,
there seems to have been a longstanding tendency for each of intervocalic B
and intervocalic W to slip over into being pronounced V, though for a long
time that would have been considered a sub-standard pronunciation. Perhaps
the proper pronunciation of the foreign name Xeba was well known to be XBH,
but a sub-standard, slangy, derisive pronunciation of that pagan goddess’s
name in Hebrew was XWH. That would nicely account for the pejorative name of
the Xeba-worshippers at Shechem then being rendered in this Biblical text as:
XWY.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois




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