Biblical Hebrew Forum

[peter_kirk AT sil.org]

Dear Lewis,

I know you didn't mean to send this item to the list. But since I saw 
it, I want to protest at the grounds for rejecting this message.

You wrote:

==========

On 6 Nov 99, at 8:35, you wrote:
Dear Dr. Pound -

I regret to have to inform you that I have rejected your message 
attached below for posting to the B-Hebrew list for the following 
reasons:

1)  What you present as your main question is a question relating 
to the Greek Bible, not the Hebrew Bible, and as such appropriate 
for B-Greek rather than B-Hebrew.

2) The rest of the post does not seem to relate directly to the 
subject matter of B-Hebrew.

Lewis Reich
B-Hebrew Staff

==========

Dr. Pound's main question is:

"In Matthew 5:18 Jesus refereed to one jot or one tittle of the Law.  
I suppose this has been presented many, many times, but if these items 
do not refer to some vocalization points, what do they refer unto?"

This is a question not about the Greek Bible, but is about an apparent 
reference to pointing in the Hebrew Bible in use in Palestine in the 
first century. It would certainly be out of scope for B-Greek, as the 
language and source of the evidence quoted are irrelevant to the 
question. I think it has already been established that the New 
Testament can be cited among other sources as evidence for the status 
and text of the Hebrew Bible in the first century.

Dr. Pound's arguments do seem to wander rather off the point of 
B-Hebrew, especially in this posting, but he has initiated an 
interesting and valuable discussion of the origin of the Masoretic 
Text and how it differs from the Vorlage of the LXX. A large part of 
the post you rejected relates to this discussion. It was not Dr. Pound 
who first introduced the possibly irrelevant question of the dating of 
New Testament documents. I don't think we should be stifling this 
discussion, although I would agree with asking Dr. Pound to stick a 
little more closely to the main point.

Peter Kirk