Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

Dear Rasmus Underbjerg Pinnerup:

Unnskyld at vi ikke kan svare på dansk.

I don’t think that your question is without merit, in fact, do we have an 
accurate indication as to how Biblical Hebrew was pronounced pre-exile? I 
suspect we don’t.

My first clue was the realization that sin and shin were treated as the same 
letter pre-exile. Then to see some words sometimes spelled with a sin, 
sometimes with a shin and that “sham” (there, that place) is from the same 
root as “sim” (to place) pretty much convinces me that pre-exilic Hebrew 
treated them as one letter in pronunciation as well as writing.

The second clue for me was the letter samech, written like the Greek letter 
xi in pre-exilic writing and in the same place in the alphabet, I believe it 
had the ‘x’ sound. However, that the second x in Artaxerxes was sometimes 
written with a samech and sometimes with a sin/shin in Ezra  indicates that 
it may have been at that time that samech was changing its pronunciation from 
x to s (the first x is written with a combination of heth - sin/shin).

(As for the shibboleth in Judges, that was a difference between samech and 
sin/shin.)

In reading the New Testament in the Majority Text, in the transliterations of 
names there are indications that there was then a shift taking place, not as 
far advanced in Galilee as in Judea (the source of Peter’s Galilean accent?), 
indications not preserved in Nestlé / Aland text. In particular, the 
indications are that post-exilic Hebrew saw the addition of the fricative to 
the begadkephath letters.

Now my question to the rest of the members: do I read my clues correctly? Are 
there other sources that either back up or counteract my interpretation? Are 
there any pre-exilic transliterations? I interpret that the shift in 
pronunciation over several generations had pretty much reached its conclusion 
in Judea by the time the New Testament was written and was close to that in 
Galilee. Am I all wet?

I prefer to read Tenakh “bli piqudim” without points and that further leads 
me to suspect that those letters had only one pronunciation pre-exile.

So what do youall think?

Karl W. Randolph.

> Dear B-Hebrew-members,
> 
> I apologize in advance if my question is trivial,…
> 
> The grammars mention, of course, the twofold pronunciation of the 
> begadkefath-letters, but as to the plosive pronunciation of peh, taw and 
> kaf, they only mention that they are unvoiced plosives - they do not 
> mention whether they are aspirated or not.
-- 
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