Biblical Hebrew Forum

["George F. Somsel" <gfsomsel AT juno.com>]

On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 13:25:45 -0400 Trevor Peterson <06PETERSON AT cua.edu>
writes:
> >===== Original Message From "wattswestmaas" 
> <wattswestmaas AT eircom.net> =====
> >A quick question about hebrew lexicons because I am not able to 
> view any of
> >them and decide for myself.
> 
> First, a quick commment about the subject line--none of these is an 
> analytical 
> lexicon. That is something different.
> >
> >I can get a two volume Koehler and Baumgartner study edition; or 
> an
> >abbreviated version prepared by William L Holladay.  What are the
> >differences?
> 
> One difference is the depth of information. Holladay's is little 
> more than a 
> glossary. Another difference is, unless I'm unaware of a new 
> edition, Holladay 
> is based on the previous edition of KBL, which means it's out of 
> date. If you 
> can afford it, you should get HALOT (the most recent edition of 
> Koehler-Baumgartner). The study edition isn't as portable as it 
> might be, but 
> it's not terrible either. For depth and completeness, it is 
> currently 
> unsurpassed. Holladay would be a handy tool for quick lookup of 
> unfamiliar 
> words as you're reading, but it's little more than that.
> >
> >Also what are the differences between the above and the standard 
> BDB?
> 
> About a century of scholarship. BDB represents the best of 19th-c. 
> Hebrew 
> lexicography. (I know there are some on this list who would disagree 
> with the 
> quality part, but it's hard to argue with the timing issue.) HALOT, 
> although 
> not as up-to-date as it could be (due to a long production time), 
> reflects a 
> lot of newly discovered information that was inaccessible to BDB. 
> The Qumran 
> material was unheard of, as was Ugaritic. Akkadian had been 
> deciphered, but it 
> was still a young discipline, and there are a lot of problems with 
> the cognate 
> evidence in BDB. HALOT may not cite every new proposal, but 20th-c. 
> 
> philological studies have contributed significantly to the potential 
> meanings 
> of words. On more common words, none of this may be terribly 
> important; but 
> for words that occur only one or two times in the biblical corpus, 
> more 
> abundant and current evidence can make a big difference. On the 
> other hand, 
> BDB is arguably the best Hebrew lexicon ever produced, if the state 
> of 
> knowledge is taken into account. In the opinion of many scholars, 
> its analysis 
> is more insightful, and the layout is more useful. Since it is 
> usually pretty 
> inexpensive as a used or reprint copy, it's definitely worth 
> having.
> 
> Trevor Peterson
> CUA/Semitics
> 
> _______________________________________________

Why not get both?  Rather than spending $125.00 / vol. for HALOT, spend
$159.00 for the whole thing.

http://www.logos.com/products/details/1455

And BDB is still not to be ignored, as Trevor stated.  It can be had in
electronic form for $49.95

http://www.logos.com/products/details/1484

or get it and a lot more for $399.95.

http://www.logos.com/originallanguages

george
gfsomsel
>From peterkirk AT qaya.org  Tue Aug 10 14:48:30 2004
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Date: Tue, 10 Aug 2004 19:48:35 +0100
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To: "Maurice A. O'Sullivan" <mauros AT iol.ie>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Analytical Lexicons.
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On 10/08/2004 19:04, Maurice A. O'Sullivan wrote:

> ...
> What you call the condensed edition of BDB -- other list members take 
> note -- is a facsimile edition, and very, very clunky to move through.


Are you sure? There is also a condensed (non-facsimile) edition which 
originally came with the Online Bible and has been distributed 
elsewhere. This is missing what I find the most useful part of BDB, the 
lists of references. There are also theologically motivated changes to 
the definitions, at least of `ALMA. This edition is, in my opinion, 
worth what it costs, which is nothing.


-- 
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/