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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Gezer Calendar and a 6-Month "Year"

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  • From: Tory Thorpe <torythrp AT yahoo.com>
  • To: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Cc: JimStinehart AT aol.com
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Gezer Calendar and a 6-Month "Year"
  • Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2007 23:24:02 -0400

Jim:

This "two" is a mere typo (should be "to") in Talmon's article. I just saw /kwl/ (Ronzevalle's proposed word in line 5) in the footnote and knew what it meant. I confess I did not see the typo until now. In any case, the verb kaph-waw-lamed does not and cannot mean "two measure." It means "to measure, measure out" -- what the farmer does with grain during the harvest. If the author of the Gezer Calendar divided years into spans of 6-months there is no hint of such in the Gezer Calendar. There is no mention of any New Year, and even if you trust Albright's old reading "month of harvest and feasting," you still have no reason to postulate two New Year celebrations six months apart in the GC (emphasis on in the GC). Allowing Albright's reading, why isn't there a second month of feasting mentioned in the GC? I also think yrh + w read as "two months" is no longer in any doubt. The months have no proper names in the Gezer Calendar (neither do the 12 months of the pre-exilic Israelian-Judean calendar, ha-abib is not a month-name), but there are clearly 12 unnamed months in the 8 agricultural periods listed the GC: 2 + 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 2 + 1 = 12.

Tory




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