Biblical Hebrew Forum

[James Read <J.Read-2 AT sms.ed.ac.uk>]

Hi,

thanks for this Yitzhak. You have provided something which finally be  
answered to.

Quoting Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>:

> On Thu, May 21, 2009 at 6:45 PM, James Read wrote:
> > Thanks for trying but this is not what I class as evidence. My basic
> > opinion is that if you wish to be taken seriously in a discussion then
> > you need to provide primary data which back up your assertions. Citing
> > secondary sources as an authority just doesn't cut any ice around here.
>
> Hi James,
>
> Citing sources does cut the ice around here.  You really can't expect
> people to start and reinvent the wheel each time.  A good source can
> give you a good background of what the various views of a particular
> text where over time, and what various objections have been raised.
> Really, these texts have been studied for thousands of years.  Don't
> you think it is wise to at least read up on the various ways the
> languages and texts have been viewed over time, rather than try to
> work it all on your own from scratch?

Of course, the reading of secondary sources can be useful it they  
reference the primary sources well. Reading secondary sources that  
comment on primary source evidence can help you understand the data  
relevant to the debate and the various interpretations and help you  
form an opinion. The method of the objective scientist is not to  
accept received wisdom but to put everything to the test so as not to  
run the risk of making misguided conclusions based on unfounded  
assumptions.

However, quoting secondary sources and the primary sources they quote  
is one thing. Telling a person to go away and read a book is a bout as  
useful as me replying 'go away and read Genesis' with no indication as  
to which part of it I feel will help you better understand the issues  
being discussed.


> In ancient times, languages were classified together based on
> historical relationships, and vice versa.  You can see this in the
> Table of Nations, where the two are essentially implied together.

Well, yes and no. It is not entirely clear that the author's intention  
was to suggest families of languages in any way.


> But modern linguistics classifies languages based on linguistic
> criteria alone.  In Indo-European linguistics, sound changes have
> proven very useful for this.  However, in Afroasiatic linguistics,
> where the languages were spoken in much nearer proximity to
> each other for long periods of time (unlike Indo-European
> languages that were spread out), this is not as useful.

Yes. Linguistics can be useful. But as with any approach you need to  
recognise its limitations before you start making conclusions and  
presenting them as an absolute truth.

If in a few thousand years time somebody had no evidence other than a  
few manuscripts from South America and North Africa he would conclude  
that the South Americans came from Rome and that the North Africans  
all came from Mecca. Anybody who quotes secondary sources as  
authorative without showing that they have considered things  
objectively and aware of the limitations and possible problems with  
the theories presented *cannot* be taken seriously in any kind of  
objective discussion of this kind.


> You can read here (Alice Faber's article in Hetzron's The
> Semitic languages) on the classification of Akkadian as
> separate from West Semitic:
> http://books.google.com/books?id=RWhvl4hD7S4C&pg=PA7
>
> Because West Semitic languages contain innovations not
> found in East Semitic, and East Semitic has innovations not
> in West Semitic, we theorize that each developed on a
> separate path rather than from the other language.  The
> main question is what to decide as an innovation. Hetzron
> suggested two principles:
> a) archaic heterogeneity.  Basically, the more heterogeneous
> a language appears to be, the more archaic it is presumed to
> be.
> b) shared morpholexical innovations.  The morpholexicon is
> the "lexicon" of the morphemes of a language.  So in English
> verbs, you have "ask", "asked", "asks", giving you -0, -ed,
> and -s as the morpholexicon of the verb.  If two languages
> show the same innovations in the morpholexicon as
> compared with another, they are presumed to be related in
> a genetic subgrouping to which the other language is not.
> They are useful because they are least susceptible to
> borrowing and relate to the structure of the language itself.
> In other words, the main principle driving the innovations
> in the morpholexicon is analogies among forms in the
> language.  Another unrelated language will have different
> forms and therefore will not generate the same analogies
> and innovations.

Again, at first glance this might seem like a good method that  
provides conclusive results. But that's more than a little naive.  
There are far too many variables to make these kind of conclusions  
with any certainty.

This is why some people prefer to include in the consideration the  
things written in the ancient sources.

e.g. if in a few thousand years somebody reads an account about how  
the Spanish collonised South America the researcher could decide to  
conclude that the South Americans once had their own indigenous  
language and spoke a Latin based dialect as a result of the  
colonisation.

The main point at the end of the day is that we can only have any kind  
of constructive and objective discussion by bringing the data to the  
fore. Assuming that something is true just because person X who you,  
for whatever reason, choose to respect is not the kind of argument  
that is likely to convince me. I think (hope) Karl will back me up in  
this stance.

James Christian





> Yitzhak Sapir
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