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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Gender, was: b-hebrew Digest, Vol 45, Issue 35

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org>
  • To: Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>
  • Cc: B-Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Gender, was: b-hebrew Digest, Vol 45, Issue 35
  • Date: Wed, 27 Sep 2006 10:32:57 +0100

On 27/09/2006 07:28, Yitzhak Sapir wrote:
On 9/27/06, Yonah Mishael wrote:
I have never heard of this book, and I don't know where I could get my
hands on it. What different light could this book shine on what
"gender" means (beyond just "feminine")? Generally it has to do with
agreement between a noun and its modifiers, regardless of the natural
gender of the given noun -- que yo sepa.

$LWM,
Yonah

Perhaps this link would be of help:
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/b-hebrew/2000-January/006407.html

From this link:
The point made by Michel is that the -a/at and -ot endings originally
were to mark nomina unitatis and the Ø and -im endings originally were
to mark collectiva.

If this was ever true, it was true in proto-Semitic or possibly in proto-West Semitic, for these endings are common at least to Hebrew, Aramaic and Arabic (with -im/-in and -ot/-aat variation), and have the same gender-related semantics in all three languages implying that the shift to a grammatical gender meaning took place before these languages separated. The implication is that this is interesting etymological research but of little relevance to the semantics of biblical Hebrew, as spoken and written many centuries after these languages separated and so even longer after these categories had shifted. The most that these older categories will be reflected in biblical Hebrew is a few traces.

--
Peter Kirk
E-mail: peter AT qaya.org
Blog: http://speakertruth.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.qaya.org/





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