Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Read, James C" <K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk>]

I'm sorry I didn't make myself clear.
When I asked about masoretic pointing I was talking about the pointing of the 
theophoric 
components. How do you account for these?

He is not the only candidate as a consonant. YHWH. All four are valid 
consanants, but Peter
has a valid argument for the final He being unpronounced.

Re; High priest
I never claimed that only the high priest knew it. It was a verb which 
everyone knew and if the
biblical hebrew language had survived we would be able to see it.
However, hebrew died and the muslims took over Isreal and so the 
pronunciation of the verb was 
lost, as was the pronunciation of every word.
The masoretes left us a way of finding the ancient pronunciations but not 
conclusively in the 
case of YHWH. Modern hebrew is a product of a very successful language 
revival, nothing more.

-----Original Message-----
From: Vadim Cherny [mailto:VadimCherny AT mail.ru]
Sent: Tue 8/2/2005 5:29 PM
To: Read, James C
Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] YHWH pronunciation
 
RE: [b-hebrew] YHWH pronunciation> The rules for hebrew syllable structure, 
to the best of my knowledge, are quite
set in stone. We have CV  CVC

well, there are all kinds; cvcc


> but I have never seen VVV

you have; YHW
But serioously, YHW is not a word, but a compound. Like an acronym, it 
doesn't conform to morphological rules.

> Plus do you think you could go through the Egyptian/Clementine evidence 
> again but
this time much slower and give links to the passages so that readers can 
verify your
proofs? It would make reading and accepting your arguments much easier.

Iao is commonly cited as an Egyptian for ass. True or not, I can't judge. 
Since our knowledge of Egyptian vowels is sparse to none, I wonder about that 
word, but it is so cited often.

Clement cited Iao variants. Someone gave references in a recent post; they 
are fairly well-known, and you can check in many online libraries. Diodorus 
was cited by Feldman in Jew and Gentile in the Ancient World.

> The IW (iota-omega) prefix we see in the LXX is quite clearly a 
> transliteration of
the shortened divine name YHW with pronuniciation Y:HoW. 

*If* YHWH is a verb, then he is relatively well heard even today, and should 
have been heard still stronger in antiquity. True, Greeks generally omit he, 
but, as I wrote to Peter, that happens in the words that have other 
consonants. In yhwh verb, he is the only candidate for consonantal 
pronunciation, and Greeks would have written it somehow, with epsilon, 
perhaps, but possibly even with gamma.
On the other hand, *if* YHW is a set of matres lectionis, then Io and Iao 
transliterations are natural.

> How do you account for the Masoretic pointing.

They deliberately mis-pointed the name, to keep it from being pronounced in 
vain. To think that they correctly vowelized the name is ridiculous. To do 
so, would have opened the name to multitude of empty pronunciations in daily 
prayers, etc.

> Another thing you should maybe take on board is that nobody said no to 
> pronounce a verb,
they only abolished the use of the verb as a name. It's more modern 
etymological child verb
HYH is among the most common verbs of the bible.

hih is not "more modern." It's Hebrew, as opposed to Aramaic hwh.
*If* YHWH is a verb, then it is ludicrous to imagine--as is clearly stated 
elsewhere--that only the high priest knew it.

Vadim Cherny



RE: [b-hebrew] YHWH pronunciation> Ok!Now I'm finally starting to understand 
you. You think IAO represents the suffixes I.You.He
which we find at the end of verbs.

nouns, too

> Your reason for this is that you feel that the IAO transliteration is more 
> valid than the others, although, I'm still not sure why.

Because it is the only attested ancient pronunciation. Clement's are 
straighforward derivations from Iao.
Other arguments include: the Egyptian word Iao with related meaning, and 
impossibility of declaring a well-known hwh verb a great secret.

> Also, do you think you could humour me and say you/yours instead of 
> thee/thine?

To avoid confusing 2nd and 3rd person.

> On to the theophoric componenents and the shortened name Yah. I still 
> haven't entirely
understood how you would relate these to your suffix theory.

Assuming that Iao stands for 1-2-3s suffixes, imagine these transformations:

3ms suffix hu (later became au, then o) could be written as he rather than 
waw. This transforms Y-H-W into Y-H-H, or YH with mappiq. Thus the form YH or 
YaH.
Writing 3ms suffix as hu instead of waw, YH becomes YHu or YHo.

> Also, how does your theory entwine with Yah's revelation of his name to 
> Moshe?

Let's keep this to linquistic issues.

> And what vowels would you have us put in YHWH to make your theoretical form 
> pronounceable?

We started from that: Iao. No vowels. YHW consist of all matres lectionis; in 
a sense, monument to the linguistic breakthrough, invention of matres 
lectionis.

> Do you agree that the theophoric components were pronounced 
> Yaho/Yahu/Y:ho/Y:hu?

No. Iota-omega. He was not pronounced precisely because it is mater 
lectionis, and its "a" sound was assimilated into omega.

> Can you cite any other examples of a 'he' maters lectionis midword?

YHW is not a morphologically normal word.

Vadim Cherny


RE: [b-hebrew] YHWH pronunciationStart with possessive suffixes: i, a, u. For 
this or that reason, not essential here, supportive consonants were 
introduced: i, ca (ta), hu.. Suffix consonants lack semantical importance. 
Also note that 3ms hu-au-o, giving rise to yhu-yho-yao variants.

There is a noun "an," essence. Ani (or, with non-essential suffix consonant, 
anoci) is "my essence," abstracized as I. Ata is anta, "thine essence" that 
became "thou." Anacnu is similarly "our essence." Different etymologies were 
proposed for hu, but for our case only u is important, 3s possessive suffix, 
making hu some word emasculated into he and 3s possessive suffix u.

Iao would be literally "my, thine, his" (i-a-u, or later i-a-o), but I 
speculate that Iao stands more generally for "I, thou, he" epitomized by the 
possessive suffixes.

Vadim Cherny

> To the best of my knowledge I,You,He would be:

)aNoCHiY)THuW)
and I really struggle to see how you turn that into a IAO transliteration.

RE: [b-hebrew] YHWH pronunciation> I am interested to know how you come about 
such a radical
theory. You must have more reason than a philosophical idea of a society.

Well, only "I, thou, he" could be pronounced Iao.. The verb cannot.
Plural suffixes are construed similarly. Duality ai (later - plural e-ei-im) 
means "thou, I". Abstract plural -o (-ot) is -au, "thou, he." This makes 
sense: using 1s, the most personal relation, for duality, and 3ms, the 
remotest, for abstract plurality.
Suffixes are vowels only. Consonants are semantical devices, vowels - 
morphological. Suffix consonants change between nouns and verbs, but vowels 
persist. Suffix consonants (caf 2s nouns, tav 2s verbs) served perhaps to 
write down suffixes without matres lectionis, or perhaps to avoid post-tonic 
gemination in penultimates-stressed nouns. This is a separate topic.
YHWH cannot be a meaningful word, like the verb, since no one could possibly 
declare a well-attested verb a great secret with unknown pronunciation.

> How would you account for the forms YaH, YaHu/YaHo with your model?

he could be mater lectionis for 2ms suffix -a. Incidentally, he is also 
"supportive consonant" of 3ms -hu-au-o. Thus, yau=yhh=yh with mappiq.
yhu=yau with mater lectionis
yho=yao=yau with 3ms hu-o

> How would you account for the transliterations IABE, IAOUAI etc.?

Iabe is literal, not phonetic transliteration; waw-beta.
Iaouai is plural form of Iao, modeled upon plural Elokim..

> Are there any patterns ANE cultures that led you to this hypothesis?

Of course, Judaism is unique.

> Is there any internal evidence in the TaNaKH which supports your theory?

Depending on how you read it. Milgrom's interpretation, I believe, is 
supportive.

Vadim Cherny

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> >Iod is pronounced as a vowel in 3ms FT, and there is no evidence
> >whatsoever that it ever was pronounced as consonant, at least as 3ms FT
> >prefix.
> >If you are inclined to dwell into this issue, it is my belief that iod in
> >3ms FT is mater lections derived from he in 3ms nouns. A similar process
> >made iod 2fs FT suffix where we could expect he.
>
> No Hebrew word, that is ZERO!, starts with a mater lectionis.

That is an assumption, not  a fact.
Definite article, aleph in Aramaic, may be a contrary example.

> Yod can be either a consonant or a mater lectionis. At the start of the
word it cannot be a
> mater lectionis. Therefore it is a consonant.

This is circular reasoning.

I don't say that iod in 3ms FT is certainly a vowel, but it might be such. I
don't know of any phonetic evidence of iod in 3ms as a consonant.

> A suffix is a suffix and cannot be separated off as part of a word. If
> the final -iy suffix were to be written separately, it would need to be
> prefixed with alef, as in the word 'iy = "island, coastland".

I don't see the point.

> >The problem is, no other hypothesis explains the pronunciation Iao. If
YHW
> >is not a compound of matres lectionis, but a regular word, he must have
been
> >pronounced.
> >
> In the Greek or Latin spelling Iao, the initial I is not a vowel but a
> consonant, according to the regular rules of Greek and Latin spelling.
> Therefore Iao would be pronounced Ya-o, two syllables starting with a
> consonant, and with a zero divider which may replace an original "h"
sound.

Possibly. But initial i is weak in Greek and, I guess, was still weaker in
Latin, not really a good consonant. Transformation ihie - yao seems unlikely
to me; something like ieie with epsilon or ixie with chi seems much more
likely. Romans could well say, ihie.

Vadim Cherny