Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Cohen, Izzy" <Izzy_Cohen AT bmc.com>]

"Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com> wrote:
> In Genesis 1:2 there is the phrase thw wbhw (tohu ubohu), ...
> Tohu occurs about 20 times in Tenakh. From its contexts I get 
> the impression that it refers to lifeless, as in uninhabited...
> I get the impression that bohu refers to the stillness of an 
> uninhabited (by humans) place. (The opposite is a crowd, 
> referred to as a "hubbub" (hmwn) for its constant restless 
> motion and noise.)
> Hence, ... "And the earth came into being lifeless (uninhabited) 
> and still, and darkness upon the face of the depths...

"Liz Fried" <lizfried AT umich.edu> wrote (twice):
1 > Dear Karl, You are completely correct! (Pace Jim West!)
2 > What you are missing is the agonizing arguments we've had 
  > over this verse for the past several years.

I have also missed these arguments. But I essentially agree
with Karl and Liz and will say why.

I believe the Hebrew heh once had a DH sound, that is:
aleph, bet, gimel, dalet, dalet-heh (together). This
may explain why the prefix heh is the "definite article" 
in Hebrew.

The B-sound and M-sound are reversals of each other and 
often exchange across languages. Compare Hebrew BoGeR 
and Latin MaJoR. Or BeiS-3oLaM and mausoleum. The "Rashi" 
bet looks almost like an M turned 90 degrees clockwise.

Giving the heh a DH/TH sound and the bet an mB/Mb sound 
produces ToDHu uMboDHu.
ToDHu cognate: OHG & German Tod = death; tot = dead.
MoDHu cognate: Latin mutus = mute

mute
1. silent
2. not emitting or having sound of any kind.

still
2. free from sound or noise.
4. free from turbulence or commotion
8. calmness or silence: the still of the night.

In many words with an ancient heh=DH, it seems that Hebrew 
has replaced that heh with a dalet while other languages 
have retained the "heh" and allowed it to become sounded 
as H. For example, in Greek:

dalet-mem (blood) = hemo-
dalet-mem-mem (bleed) = hymen
aleph-dalet-mem (man, person) = homo

For a retained DH sound in Greek, compare:
aleph-dalet-[mem-heh] (ground, earth, soil) = chthon > Latin humus
dalet-gimel (fish) <=reversed=> ichthy-

dosh kham,
Israel Cohen
izzy_cohen AT bmc.com