Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Raymond de Hoop <rdehoop AT tref.nl>]

Dear Soren,

There seems to be good reason to suppose that the Masoretic accents are of
an earlier date than the vowel pointing. Reference can be made to studies
by
E.J. Revell, esp. the following:
1971-72. The Oldest Evidence for the Hebrew Accent System, BJRL 54, 214-222.
1976. Biblical Punctuation and Chant in the Second Temple Period, JSJ 7,
181-198.
1981. Pausal Forms and the Structure of Biblical Poetry, VT 31, 186-199.
1992. Masoretic Accents, in: ABD, vol. 4, 594-596.

However, the age of a tradition does not garantee its correctness, so
sometimes the masoretic accents clearly redflect the Masoretic
interpretation; cf.

M.B. Cohen, 1972. Masoretic Accents as a Biblical Commentary, JANES 4, 3-11.
D.B. Freedman,& M.B. Cohen, 1974. The Masoretes as Exegetes: Selected
Examples, SBL.MasSt 1, 35-46.


I hope this might help,

Raymond




>Shalom
>Does anyone know of anything to indicate that the Masoretic punctuation
>marks (sof pasuq, atnakh etc.) might be a later phenomenon than the actual
>vowel pointing? (Question arose in class when I suggested solving a text
>critical problem by dividing up two verses differently).
>
>regards
>Soren Holst
>Copenhagen




____________________________________________________________________________

Dr Raymond de Hoop
Boeiersingel 11
NL-9745 CA Groningen
The Netherlands
Phone: (XX-31)-(0)50 553 01 15
E-mail: rdehoop AT tref.nl