Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Ian Hutchesson <mc2499 AT mclink.it>]

Dear Stephen,

Thanks for showing that I need to elucidate my thought on the use of the
analogy between Latin and DSS Hebrew.

At 22.54 21/05/99 -0400, Stephen C. Carlson wrote:
>I'm not sure why you're so resistant to the analogy.  

I have no real problem with the analogy, other than the fact that analogies
aren't really tools for argument, but for clarification. In the case of the
analogy between Latin and DSS Hebrew the facts are not known for Hebrew, so
it is not a case of clarification, but of imputing what those facts should be.

And you will note in all your further analogies below that there is a
rather long period involved in the development of the tradition leading to
the fossilisation of the language involved. None of this is the case with
DSS Hebrew. We are dealing with a much smaller timescale and a total lack
of bureaucratic superstructure and schooling implied by all the examples
you have proffered. When the analogy is tested against the information we
have, it proves to be unsound. Languages don't become formal overnight and
there is nothing to indicate that DSS Hebrew was formal. In fact, the
opposite seems to be the case -- quite an informal mixture of linguistic
elements, with old things preserved and new things absorbed, while the
closest thing to a formal language, the Hebrew of the majority of biblical
documents, is not the working language of the writers of the DSS.

The analogy when examined simply doesn't work.

>It is a fact that
>in many cultures the writing system is highly conservative, even to the
>point of requiring literate people to essentially learn a second language
>to write, especially in religious texts.  I'm not just thinking of the
>nearly exclusive use of Latin in Italy well until the 14th cen., but the
>use of wenyan in China until the baihua movement at the end of the Qing
>dynasty, the use of Sanskrit in India, the dominance of classical
>Arabic, etc.
>
>I suppose you're trying to establish that a presumption that a written
>text is by default written in a language that is currently being spoken.

No. I would argue from the orthographical and phonological indications
found in the scrolls themselves that we were dealing with a productive
spoken language. There are numerous cases showing that the pronunciation of
words is actively constructed in the writing, making sure, for example,
that a waw or a yod was pronounced as consonants by the insertion of an
alef. (And see my response to Rolf for a little more on the spoken nature
of the DSS dialect.)


Ian

>As numerous, transcultural examples go, this presumption is a dicey
>proposition.  I'm not expressing an opinion about your conclusions
>with respect to the DSS, just that the methodology you seem to wish
>to apply does not appear to obtain usable results for many texts
>throughout the world.