Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

Joel:

Is not your rejection of etymology a bit simplistic?

For example, historically speaking, English is more 
accurately described as a creole, not an integrated 
language. What little contact I have had with creoles 
showed surprising uses of words, often with tenuous at 
best connections to their etymology. Even the same word 
imported at different periods can have strikingly different 
meanings and forms. Thus English is a poor language to 
use in a study of etymologies.

Secondly one must be careful with words borrowed 
across language barriers: the borrowing language may 
take an idiomatic or slang usage of the word, not the 
standard meaning as used in the originating language.

On the other hand, even in English, those words that are 
derived by grammatical structure from a common root tend 
to stay closer to their etymological meaning. For example, 
in order to advertise, one either becomes or hires an 
advertiser to make an advertisement. The very fact that the 
latter words are tied to the root through grammatical rules 
tends to tie the meanings to the root. Many, if not most, 
Biblical Hebrew words are grammatical constructs from 
common roots, hence usually, though not always, have a 
commonality of meaning with their roots and with other 
grammatical derivatives from the same root. Warning 
here, some of the grammatical derivatives may have the 
same forms as grammatical derivatives from different 
roots, the contexts usually indicate the correct ones.

When carefully used, I think that etymological study of 
Biblical Hebrew can often lead to a proper understanding 
of lexemes. What you have described are two extremes, 
neither of which are correct.

Karl W. Randolph.

Ps. a "chocoholic" may actually be an addict, as the sugar 
used is an artificial (refined out of its natural form) 
sweetener that is addictive. After having gone through 
cold turkey withdrawal (yes, the symptoms are real), I now 
refuse to buy foods made with artificial sweeteners.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dr. Joel M. Hoffman" <joel AT exc.com>
> 
> > How many non-Semitic languages are oout there with rigid root system and 
> > no
> > excessiveness? Even in Russian, aspect affixes more or less mandate the
> > semantics.
> 
> Well, if you're looking for a language system with a root system (I
> don't know what you mean by "no excessiveness"), how about Modern
> Hebrew and Modern Arabaic?  This is why I keep trying to introduce
> evidence from those langauges.
> 
> But we can even look at English.  An "alcoholic" is an addict.  A
> "chocoholic," though clearly patterned on "alcoholic," in a fan, not
> at addict.
> 
> More generally, to evaluate a theory of language, I think it's useful
> to test the theory on a living language, because with living languages
> it is easier to know if the theory is helpful.
> 
> For example, some people assume that etymology is the strongest clue
> to word meaning.  By contrast, I look at English "host" and "hostile,"
> for example, which though they come from the same root do not mean
> even almost the same thing, and, based on evidence from living
> languages, conclude that etymology is not clear evidence of what a
> word means.  Then I refuse to give it much weight in trying to
> decipher ancient languages.  Other people ignore (or don't know about)
> the evidence from living languages and (wrongly, IMO) conclude that
> etymology tells us what words mean in ancient languages.
> 
> Similarly, I look at modern languages, and note that there is no
> language in which form completely determines meaning, and conclude
> that it did not in ancient Hebrew, either.
> 
> 
> -Joel Hoffman
>   http://www.exc.com/JoelHoffman

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