Biblical Hebrew Forum

["George Athas" <george.athas AT moore.edu.au>]

No, Isaac, the particle -UT is not a 'random syllable' - no one has
ever said it was. Nor am I saying that it is a 'heedless hoot'. Your
caricature of my statement is most unscholarly, and I'm reticent to
respond to it. Nonetheless, I'll accord you the dignity of a response,
despite your condescending rhetoric.

The particle -UT is an abstract noun marker, much the same way the
particle -tion is in English. For example, if you take the words
'corrupt', 'operate' or 'animate' and add the particle -tion to them,
you end up with some abstract nouns: corruption, operation, and
animation. There are even words in which the particle -tion is an
integral and irremovable part, such as 'nation' or 'salvation'.  Or,
to take another example, the particle -ism can be added to words
yielding such abstract nouns as tourism, communism, and
fundamentalism.

The particle -UT works in a very similar way to these in Hebrew and
Aramaic.

I expect you'll disagree with this, but please do so with some
respect, also acknowledging that this is what the scholarly consensus
is.

 

GEORGE ATHAS 
Moore Theological College (Sydney) 
1 King St, Newtown, NSW 2042, Australia 
Ph: (+61 2) 9577 9774