Biblical Hebrew Forum

["K Randolph" <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Harold:

On 9/29/06, Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com> wrote:
> K Randolph wrote:
>
> > Why all this effort to support the LXX reading?
>
> HH: It is also the Vulgate reading, which Jerome
> did from the Hebrew. And the Syriac reading
> apparently agrees with the LXX. And there are
> Hebrew variants that do, one as old as the Dead
> Sea Scrolls.
The Hebrew variant that I saw does not support the LXX reading. It
does support the fact that K)RW is a verb ("as a lion" is gibberish),
but not its meaning. What I question is the mental gymnastics trying
to support the LXX meaning, when another meaning attested to elsewhere
fits far better.

The Vulgate and Syriac came out after the LXX, most likely consulted
the LXX and, because of the same forgetfulness as to its meaning,
translated it similarly.
> > After all, was not LXX written because people were forgetting Biblical
> > Hebrew? This was not only true among the Greek speaking diaspora, but
> > also among the Aramaic speaking  Jews of Babylon and Judea / Galilee.
> > Thus it is understandable that when the translators reached Psalm
> > 22:17, seeing a word that they did not recognize, tried to say that it
> > was KRH with an added aleph. But there is a root K)R that is extant
> > not only here, but also in Akkadian and in Amos 8:8, so why not go
> > with it?
>
>
> HH: In Amos 8:8 it is apparently a defective form
> for KY)R, as its parallel with KY)WR MRYM in the
> next colon demonstrates, as well as the repetition
> of the same phrase in 9:5.
The next colon is not necessarily a parallel. I considered that, but
the grammar makes it unlikely.

How do you know that Amos 9:5 is not the defective copy? There are
more than just that one difference, rather there are several.
> > By the way, KRH in Biblical Hebrew did not mean "to dig", rather "to
> > provide (for)" which was often used, particularly in Genesis, in the
> > context of providing wells for watering sheep when out in the
> > pastures. True, digging was the means by which wells were provided,
> > but the word is "provide".
>
> HH: Check your lexicons.
Why not go one better, check your concordance and see how the word is
actually used. I used Lisowski.

> Yours,
> Harold Holmyard

Steven:

What I have seen of Ken Penner's material is inconclusive. It's
convincing only to one who wants to be convinced. It does support the
claim that many Jews in Judea and Galilee studied Hebrew, but they no
longer used Biblical Hebrew, which would allow for hapax legomenon
terms to have been forgotten, even some used a few times in Tanakh. It
would allow for the misidentification of flora and fauna that no
longer inhabited the area. So, yes, Biblical Hebrew was being
forgotten also Judea and Galilee.

Karl W. Randolph.