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  • From: "Charles David Isbell" <cisbell AT home.com>
  • To: "Trevor & Julie Peterson" <06peterson AT cua.edu>, "Biblical Hebrew" <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Hebrew philology (somewhat off topic)
  • Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2001 21:15:30 -0500


Tervor,
Actually MH has specific equivalents for the words you mention: "philology"
is "BaLShaNuT," a "linguist" is a "BaLShaN." I am aware of three
possibilities for their development. [a] Both are formed from the root
B-L-Sh, "to investigate, inquire, detect" [or slang, "to snoop"]. [b] The
prefix B- may be a short form of BeN, and this would yield a meaning like
"son of a language" for BaLShaN [from BeN-LaShaN, if there is a shift from
"O" to "Ah" as is known from Hebrew to Aramaic, e.g.]. [c] BaL may be a
quickened pronunciation of Ba`aL with the L doing double duty. Here
Ba`aL-LaShaN would imply "master of a language."
I would be interested if others on the list know the true development of the
words BaLShaN and BaLShaNuT.
Hope this helps,
Charles David Isbell
----- Original Message -----
From: "Trevor & Julie Peterson" <06peterson AT cua.edu>
To: "Biblical Hebrew" <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
Sent: Saturday, August 04, 2001 8:59 PM
Subject: Hebrew philology (somewhat off topic)


> Okay, I'm going to betray my ignorance of Modern Hebrew here. Does anyone
> know the Hebrew equivalent(s) of "philology," "philologist," etc.? It's
> mainly just a curiosity. It struck me the other day that the Semitic
> philologist (in English-speaking environments, anyway) goes through life
> with a Greek title. Doesn't see quite right to me. Anyway, I don't have
> any resources handy to look up such a thing, and about the best I could do
> for a makeshift translation is:
>
> English: philology
> Translit: )aH(a)BaTDaaBaaR
> Readable: Ahavatdavar
>
> English: philologist/philological?
> Translit: )ooHeeBDaaBaaR
> Readable: Ohevdavar
>
> English: philologists
> Translit: )ooH(a)BeeDaaBaaR
> Readable: Ohavedavar
>
> I'm probably way off here. It seems like the Qal act. ptc. of )HB would
> work for both one who loves and the adjectival sense of loving DBR. The
> derived noun would work for love of DBR itself. I'm not even sure that I
> like DBR as an equivalent of LOGOS, but given the sense of what the
complete
> term is supposed to mean, I think it works. Probably not even close to
the
> real term . . .
>
> Trevor Peterson
> CUA/Semitics
>
> As in contemporary discos, so in contemporary descriptions of Canaanite
> poetry, much is done under the cover of music that is amusing but not
> entirely licit. --M. O'Connor, 1978
>
>
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