Biblical Hebrew Forum

[peter_kirk AT sil.org]

Dear Ian,

I don't know why you responded to my posting about bilingualism with a 
lengthy and repetitive attack on the historicity of Ezra, which was 
not at all my point here. It was merely a point of comparison. I am 
trying to make one point and one point only, which is about 
bilingualism. The rest was merely in passing and should be dropped, or 
at least relegated to the separate thread about the reliability of 
Ezra.

Josephus gives clear evidence of bilingualism, in that many people had 
learned the "language of many nations" (not "dialects", "dialekton" is 
surely singular, and means "language" rather than "dialect") and so 
were bilingual. If the distinction he makes is not a class 
distinction, what is it?

I didn't start the thread on bilingualism, perhaps Henry did. If you 
are not interested in this, why have you been posting again and again 
about it?

Peter Kirk


______________________________ Reply Separator 
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Subject: Re[11]: Hebrew & Aramaic again (Peter)
Author:  mc2499 AT mclink.it at internet
Date:    21/07/1999 21:29


Dear Peter,

Your reinvention of Josephus isn't very helpful in the discussion, 
insinuating Greek into his words where he says "dialects of many nations", 
then go on to argue that there was a class distinction that favours the 
lower classes knowing languages but not the upper classes. (Have you got 
any sociolinguistic precedents for your hypothesis of such a phenomenon? 
There are many for the contrary.)

Whereas the Jewish "nation" discourages the learning of languages in the 
Josephus passage, you have suddenly manipulated the stuff about "common" 
and "slave" to insinuate a class distinction into Josephus's meaning. As I 
said, you have stretched too little too far.

You wrote:

>I have a serious point, which we can
>understand from the type of hypothetical court case which we used to 
>discuss. You are making a case for your hypothesis that bilingualism 
>was rare,

I am not very interested in bilingualism, Peter. This is only you 
obfuscating a discussion about the Ezra traditions in literature. 
Nevertheless, I have seen very little to indicate bilingualism, and the 
text on which you have based your analysis, the Jewish condemnation of 
learning of the dialects of many nations, doesn't reflect on the sort of 
bilingualism you were trying to argue for -- hence your reinvention, 
insinuating Greek.

Bilingualism is a side-issue you have introduced. Neither its relevance nor 
even its veracity has been sustained.

<snip>