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  • From: Bearpecs AT aol.com
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] dating of matres lectionis
  • Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2005 16:56:09 EDT


In a message dated 7/26/2005 1:15:23 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il writes:

Actually, the final W in Shema'ayahu is not a mater lectionis, since the
..yahu is an abbreviation of YHWH, in which the W is obviously consonental.
I'm not sure how it was pronounced, but it was not written just to indicate
the vowel u.



How can you say the waw is "obviously" consonantal. What evidence do you
have for this?
The same name is spelled $MRYW in the Samaritan Ostraca, where it is to be
interpreted as $:maryaw, the theophorus element contracted from $:maryahu in
keeping with a common phonological change in Northern Israelite. There, the
waw is indeed consonantal, but it is a glide which developed from 'u' being
contiguous to 'a'; "in Judahite, by and large, the fuller form yhw was
preserved, while in the North, the he had already been lost, yw." (Cross &
Freedman,
p. 51.)
But we have no evidence AFAIK that theophoric names ever contained an
element in which both the heh and waw were consonantal.

btw: Freedman & Cross (p. 41) on Y-HWH in the Me$a` stele:
(Wherever I use a dash, read "a". For e with a macron above, I use e~.)
" 'Y-hweh,' *y-hwe~ < *y-hwiy(u). The he is a mater lectionis for final e~."

Hayyim






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