Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Yitzhak Sapir" <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>]

On 11/29/06, Bryant J. Williams III wrote:
> Dear Peter, Yitzhak, et al,
>
> I wonder if the acrostic Psalms are early enough to indicate the separation
> or non-separation of sin and shin? It is apparent that most of the Psalms
> are Pre-exilic to Exilic (Post-exilic?) and that they may give some
> indication of the debate on the alphabet. Besides inscriptions wouldn't
> Hebrew poetry retain early grammar and syntactical features to help in this
> debate?

An acrostic psalm like Psalm 119 interchanges the Shin and Sin in the 21st
position.  However, why do you think that the acrostic would necessarily
place together verses that begin with the same phonetical variants as opposed
to the same graphical letter?

Yitzhak Sapir