Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

Karl,

If by "the claim you mentioned in the paragraph at the bottom of this note" 
you mean "the insistance of some scholars that anything in the ANE must be 
somehow related to the Bible, and that the "Patriarchal traditions" in the 
Bible MUST reflect a "pre-Israelite" reality", than I agree, this claim is 
also absurd.

Where I don't think that I agree with you is when your state that "they 
assume that any name that is also reported in Tanakh therefore refers to a 
Biblical individual is a de facto denial that names may have been reused by 
ancient, Semitic peoples".

Do you mean that anyone who thinks that "Abraham" was a real person 
automatically denies that there may have been other, unrelated, people who 
were also named "Abraham"? Why?

Yigal Levin


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>
To: "Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>; "b-hebrew" 
<b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Monday, June 26, 2006 9:34 PM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Benjamin


> Yigal:
>
> I agree with you that it sounds absurd. But no less
> absurd than the claim you mentioned in the
> paragraph at the bottom of this note.
>
> While I know of no one who explicitly makes the
> claim I reported below, that they assume that any
> name that is also reported in Tanakh therefore
> refers to a Biblical individual is a de facto denial
> that names may have been reused by ancient,
> Semitic peoples.
>
> Karl W. Randolph.
>
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>
> >
> > Does anyone really make that claim? It sound absurd. Even in the Bible 
> > there
> > are often different charecters with the same name.
> >
> > Yigal
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>
> >
> > > And may I add to that the refusal to acknowledge
> > > that some names may have been reused by different
> > > Semitic peoples. Not just may have, but most
> > > certainly were. Not only the names of individuals,
> > > but also the heads of tribes who passed their names
> > > onto their peoples and places.
> > >
> > > The myth that names were not reused is
> > > perpetuated by not recognizing that Tanakh is
> > > limited in its scope, recording only a small
> > > minority of the events and peoples that fall under
> > > its historical span.
> > >
> > > Karl W. Randolph.
> > >
> > >> ----- Original Message -----
> > >> From: "Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>
> > >>
> > >> Two things. First, the linguistic similarity of the Mari 
> > >> "Benjaminites" to
> > >> those in Israel. Second, the insistance of some scholars that anything 
> > >> in
> > >> the ANE must be somehow related to the Bible, and that the 
> > >> "Patriarchal
> > >> traditions" in the Bible MUST reflect a "pre-Israelite" reality.
> > >>
> > >> Yigal
>
> --
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