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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Hidden Agendas in Rolf's Thesis, Methods and Data

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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] Hidden Agendas in Rolf's Thesis, Methods and Data
  • Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 10:41:50 +0000

On 19/03/2007 02:11, Yitzhak Sapir wrote:
...
According to the Wikipedia author quoted before, whose ip is from
Norway, Rolf is a Jehovah's Witness.

I don't know that he has ever identified himself as such, ...

This has been known to some of us for a very long time. I don't think Rolf has ever explicitly stated this on this list, or any of the others on which I have interacted with him, although he has defended a number of JW positions as well as the New World translation of the Bible made by JWs. However, a few years I did find an online article written by him in which he identified himself as a JW. I don't think this need affect his basic scholarship, which should stand or fall on its own merits. But it is relevant to some of the issues he has raised publicly, for example those relevant to JW doctrines. Among such issues may well be his understanding of NP$ nephesh, which is not the normal scholarly one, and of course the pronunciation of the divine name. I am unsure how far his work on the Hebrew verbal system can be related to JW teaching, although I have heard it alleged (and not just by you later in this post) that the New World translation renders verbs more or less as in Rolf's theories and so that his theories can be understood as an attempt after the fact to justify this translation. I would not want that argument to be used to discredit Rolf's theories, which should be allowed to stand on their own merits if they have any.

... The book itself was not reviewed before
publication, which is what peer review means.

While I agree with you, Yitzhak, that Rolf does not seem to have been completely open and honest about this, I thought the book in question was his PhD thesis which was presumably read carefully by examiners and accepted as sufficient for a PhD - assuming of course that Rolf has accurately reported that it was accepted, and that the published form is the same as what was accepted.

So really, in the end, a small point. I just said it was published privately,
and Rolf stated that it was not, despite the fact that he apparently knows
full well that he published it privately, since he is himself the publisher.
...

Yitzhak, you are actually going a little beyond the evidence here. The publisher could be a member of Rolf's family, or even someone unrelated who lives at the same address. But this does at least show a lack of complete openness, for the publisher is at the very least someone personally well known to Rolf and who seems to have published only his books.

... Maybe this
book is to be criticised for expounding a Jehovah's Witness verbal system
in the guise of academic study. That is, this isn't a simple revolutionary
attempt to read the verbal system of Hebrew. It is an attempt to defend a
Jehovah's Witness outlook on the verbal system. For example, perhaps
let us assume that because of some lack of expertise on the part of NWT
translators, some verbs which were intended past were translated future.
Rolf's study then comes to an aid and says that this is not a problem
because it is not that NWT translators got it wrong. It is that we don't
understand the verbal system of Hebrew.

If Rolf were simply to point out that we cannot prove that the NWT translators were wrong because we don't know enough about the system, then he might have a good point. But by trying to insist that they are correct (if that is what he is doing) he overreaches himself.

...
I welcome the study by George Athas. I am not saying a new reading
of the Hebrew verbal system is out of place. I also think most Jehovah
Witness members of this list are probably wholesome in their intentions,
although I would probably be double checking from now on. But I cannot
trust the data, conclusions, and methods as discussed by Rolf. ...

Thank you for this, Yitzhak. Although I would not personally want to take the matter as far as you do, I too have serious concerns about Rolf's data, conclusions and methods. Indeed one of the main reasons why I have stayed on this list is so that I can continue to point out these difficulties whenever they come up here.

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





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