Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Schmuel <schmuel AT nyc.rr.com>]

Hi Folks, 

1 Samuel 13:21 (KJB)
Yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the coulters,  
and for the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the goads.  
   (Hebr: a file with mouthes)  

1 Samuel 13:21 (Holman)
The price was two-thirds of a shekel for plowshares and mattocks, 
and one-third [of a shekel] for pitchforks and axes, 
and for putting a point on an oxgoad. 

The late Michael Weitzman has a reference
http://www.tyndale.org/Reformation/1/weitzman.html
The solution came through the discovery in the Holy Land, starting at the 
beginning of this century, of ancient weight inscribed with the Hebrew 
letters pym ... (This suggestion was published by E.1. Pilcher, 'A New Hebrew 
Weight', Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund (1914), p. 99. 
Pilcher makes it clear, however, that the suggestion was due to Mr Samuel 
Raffaeli, who had acquired the third example known of the pim weight. )

Yet in other places it appears that this is a rather conjectural akkadian 
cognate idea, not "Hebrew letters".

(google cache) 
<http://www.biblecentre.net/ot/twot/pe/pe15.html>http://www.biblecentre.net/ot/twot/pe/pe15.html
  
 pim ...was formerly connected with peh... Now the word has been found 
inscribed on several weights of two-third shekel size. Speiser (see 
bibliography) suggested that the word is a dual and arose from a false 
Hebraizing of the Akkadian shanipu (a Sumerian loan word for two-thirds of a 
shekel), reading it as two p<s therefore in Hebrew a dual of peh ­ payim . 
(the ordinary plural of peh “mouth” has a feminine ending).(the ordinary 
plural of peh “mouth” has a feminine ending). 

Are these basically the same archaelogical references ?  
Are we talking about Hebrew letters or a rather super-conjectural Akkadian 
cognate relationship ?

Thanks.

Rashi 
http://www.chabad.org/library/article.asp?AID=15842&showrashi=true  
21. And there was a file for the mattocks and for the colters  
     and for the three-pronged pitchforks and for the axes, and to set the 
goad. 
And there was the file for the mattocks  
And those who found it overly troublesome to go down to the Philistines to 
sharpen had an implement called ‘pezirah pim,’ ‘lime’ in French (a file), 
which has many mouths, i.e., many sharp surfaces. They had this to sharpen 
the mattocks and the colters.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic