Biblical Hebrew Forum

[<gs02wmr AT panther.Gsu.EDU>]

On Sun, 8 Aug 1999 peter_kirk AT sil.org wrote:
> I'm trying to make something of this, in the light also of Henry's 
> comments. Well, the name "Assyrian", in the abbreviated form "Syriac" 
> (so I have heard - is that true?) and even today in such modified 
> forms as "Aisor" and "Suryani", is used for various Aramaic dialects. 

I believe you are right. Syriac is the language of Christians in Lebanon,
Syria, and some parts of Egypt who speak what you'd call "Christian
Aramaic." This goes back to the old discussion we had of the word "Alaha"
- where the genuine Arabic word for the generic denotation of (any) god is
"ilaah," and a close transcription of that into Syriac would be "aalaah."

From what I've studied, Syriac was originally a dialect derived from the
Syrian Semitic parlance prior to the 7th Century. "Aramaic" is simply a
Semitic dialect of Syriac as well as 'Qaysi' from the Quraysh(tribe of
Muhammad) which later turned into what is called the Arabic language
today.  Learning it for scholarly purposes is understandable, but it is a
very ancient way of speaking Arabic. It is the "Latin" of the Arab world.

BTW - what is there such a thing as "Ashuric Hebrew/Arabic"(this was also
mentioned on the cult's web page) ? 

> Biblical Aramaic form of SHALOM is SHELAM [$:LFM], with a long A in 
> the second syllable. So is the point being made here that many 
> Israelites became Aramaic speaking (and started to use the square 
> Aramaic characters) during the exile and because of this many Jewish 
> texts are in Aramaic? If so, this part of the article seems to be a 
> rather confused version of a generally accepted truth, with the phrase 
> "Assyrian Hebrew" in fact meaning "Aramaic as spoken by Jews". The 
> relationship between Hebrew and Aramaic might just be classifiable as 
> a dialect difference, but I think Aramaic speakers ancient and modern 
> would not accept Aramaic being called a dialect of Hebrew!

You are very correct! These languages are certainly cognate, but hardly
dialects. I had the unfortunate experience of speaking with one of the
members of this cult(who introduced me to his webpage), where he made the
grossly ignorant claim that "Arabic and Hebrew are the same language, just
different dialects."

> But then "Ancient Hebrew" in this article is presumably a reference to 
> biblical Hebrew. As Henry has pointed out, it is clear that SHALOM was 
> spoken with a second vowel O in Hebrew of the period of the monarchy, 
> and later, but SHALAM may have been correct for very early days e.g. 
> the patriarchal period. Yes, Joseph may have said SHALAM to his 
> brothers (Gen 43:23). Are these people trying to revive this ancient 
> pronunciation of Hebrew, or perhaps they are trying to promote 
> Aramaic?

It is an attempt to revive what they believe as ancient pronunciations of
Hebrew, proper celebrations of Hebrew rites, Hebrew customs, culture, and
a way of life that was pure - prior to the "Ashkenazi invasion which
polluted the Judaic religion."  So you see, they are lunatics. ;-)

Shalum

Wondell M. Rachman