Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

On 12/27/06, Steve Miller wrote:
> > From: Yitzhak Sapir Sent: Tuesday, December 26, 2006 1:44 PM
> > I am not sure what Steve Miller was trying to say.  However, the fact that
> > the
> > DSS text is fuller simply means a different spelling convention of the
> > vowels.
>
> [Steve Miller] Yitzhak,
> How far back does the written basis for the MT vowels go, in particular the
> holem?
>
> Is a person who believes (as I do) that every word of the Tanach is inspired
> by God, consistent with this belief if he feels free to change the vowels,
> particularly the holem?

Dear Steve,

There is no contradiction at all between the two.  Language, especially
spoken language, but even written language, changes through time.  This
includes grammar, vocabulary, and also phonetics.  That is, a word
that sounded one way 500 years ago will sound differently today and
sound differently in 500 years.  This is a regular observed feature of
all languages.  Hebrew has a long history.  This history did not end
abruptly 2000 years ago.  Even after Hebrew stopped being a spoken
language, which I think probably happened around the 3rd or 4th
century CE, Hebrew continued to develop.  Thus, for example, all
long "a" vowels shifted to "ɔ" -- that is, qamats.  There is no evidence
this happened prior to the 5th century CE.  So the vowel system,
where this change is systematic, like in the Tiberian one, could not
have been written down prior to this development.  The Massoretes
did not have a magical description somewhere of how the text was
pronounced hundreds of years beforehand.  They only knew how
they pronounced it -- a reading tradition that had been passed down
from a long time beforehand.  Consonants that merged (such as Sin
and Samekh, various forms of Ayin and Het), vowel developments,
etc. could only be recorded hereon in the form they recognized.
Because of all these changes, some of the details of the mater
lectiones system in the Bible was unclear because they didn't
understand them.  For them, the vowel letter was optional, but for
the original recorders of this system, the vowel letter was probably
systematic.  So, changes, including the holam, happen even when
the scribe or reader is not interested in consciously changing the
vowel sound or consonant sound.  This has nothing to do with the
question of whether every word is inspired by God or not.

Now, varying pronunciations can lead to variant readings.  All kinds
of possibilities present themselves.  It is possible, for example, for
a divergent variant reading to gain popularity, due to a sermon that
comes to explain this word.  This is just an example, but it suggests
a way that a particular pronunciation of the world might prevail even
in reading traditions where this pronunciation would have developed
differently.

One should therefore keep in mind that the vowels as we have them
represent a very late pronunciation of Hebrew, but, unlike Karl would
have it, represent an authentic reading tradition.  That is, just
because the scribes wrote these vowels at some point in time,
doesn't mean they made them up.  In other words, the notes and
vowels that they added were not necessarily any less inspired than
the written text that they passed on.  People's point of view on what
is inspired may differ, and this list is not the place to discuss what is
or is not inspired, so Karl's viewpoint that "while the original
consonantal text was inspired by God, the preserved pronunciation is
not" is just as legitimate as saying it was all inspired or all not
inspired.  But if the question of an authentic reading tradition comes
up, then there is no problem explaining the different vocalic systems
for vowels as different points in the development of the tradition.

Yitzhak Sapir