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  • From: Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>
  • To: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ktiva & Kria
  • Date: Sat, 03 Nov 2007 21:05:06 +0200

Dear Edward,

Without getting into your theory, which I have not studied enough to agree or disagree with, I wish to comment on the following paragraph of your post:

(4) The identification of letters of the Hebrew alphabet with numbers
is very old, going back to pre-Davidic period: just look at the series
of David's psalms which are alphabetic acrostics; by the way, the word
"acrostic" being of Greek origins, it does not mean that the Greeks
invented this poetical genre.

Thanks a lot,

Edward


1. While the basic order of the letters (with some variations) seems to go back to the very origins of the alphabet, way back in Middle Bronze Age Canaan (or maybe Canaanites in Egypt), the actual assignment of numbers for each letter (what became known as "gematria" in Jewish circles) is not attested in pre-Hellenistic times and seems to have been borrowed from Greek. The fact that various Psalm and other biblical passages were written as acrostics has nothing to do with the assignment of numbers.

2. Most modern scholars would argue that many of "David's Psalms" are actually pseudoepigraphic, but I'm not going to get into a debate on the issue.

3. Please sign your posts with your full name.

Yigal Levin




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