Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>]

Dear Rolf,

You wrote earlier, "Even if the first vowel is an "a" sound, that does not 
necessarily argue in favor of a patah as the first vowel of YHWH,  For 
example, 
the names Gedalyahu and Gemaryahu both has the sign representing GA as 
their first syllable, and these names have no theophoric elements at the 
beginning."  I interpret this to mean, "Even if the first vowel [of
the Babylonian
transcription of initial theophoric element Yahwistic names] is an 'a' sound, 
[and we assume that Yahwistic names use a pronounciation close to the
pronounciation of yhwh], that does not necessarily argue in favor of a patah 
as 
the first vowel of yhwh, [because] the names Gedalyahu and Gemaryahu both
[have] the sign representing GA as their first syllable, [and yet their MT 
pronounciation has a schwa] and these names have no theophoric elements
at the beginning [that might otherwise cause the Massoretes to change the
pronounciation for fear of profaning the sacred.]"  That's quite a lot of 
brackets, and otherwise I can't figure out the paragraph.  Is this a proper 
restatement of what you meant?

Yitzhak Sapir