Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Jonathan D. Safren" <yonsaf AT beitberl.ac.il>]

Maria Solarez wrote:

> Thank you for this wonderful food for thought and discussion.
>
> Is there enough of the Canaanite language around to consider BH a dialect 
> or subset?
> Is enought known about the society at the time span of the writings of BH 
> to be
> certain that the Canaanite language is not a subset of something else?
>
> Forgive my lack of precision in this setting. however, my questions remains 
> Enlighten
> me please..
>
>

Much depends on how you define a "language" or a "dialect". Plattdeutsch and 
Hochdeutsch
are both considered "German", though the differences between them are 
considerable..
There are also differences between BH and, say, Moabite or Phoenician. but 
they can all
be considered, in my opinion, dialects of "Canaanite". Even the Book of 
Isaiah defines
Hebrew as sefat kana'an, "the language of Canaan:", in one place, but as 
yehudit,
"Judaean", in another.. So we are talking about dialects. Ugaritic is another 
matter,
however.
Yours,
Jonathan
--
Jonathan D. Safren
Dept. of Biblical Studies
Beit Berl College
44905 Beit Berl Post Office
Israel