Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

On Tue, Dec 16, 2008 at 10:26 PM, Yitzhak Sapir wrote:

> Dear David,
>
> Could you please quote in full the Masora comment,
> preferably with a list of the six pairs, as well as its
> relevance to the issue at hand?
>
> As for Gen 34:11, do you have any example of
> dependable Tiberian vocalization that has darga?
> For example, I understand that Breuer does not list
> this verse in his list of variants, suggesting that the
> vocalization he employs (merkha) is consistent in
> all of them.
>
> Yitzhak Sapir

To somewhat clarify my position, there is no doubt that
late pronunciations do use a vocal schewa in some of
these cases.  However, this is not an original Tiberian
pronunciation and at best is an superposition of a
European pronunciation over the Tiberian one.  Again,
it is a mistake to apply it to a Bible vocalized in the
Tiberian tradition. It is also important to recognize that
the rules in Diqduqe Hateamim or other Masoretic
works that define the Tiberian tradition are potentially
different in this regard than those of Heidenheim's or
in the Letteris Bible.

Best,
Yitzhak Sapir