Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>]

Hello Ratson,

While I think you had good intentions in mind, you also posted various
stuff that was either wrong.  In the case of the Shibbolet story, you
suggested that it centers around the differences in perception of the
pronunciation of [th] as either th or s, but that position dates from
the late 1980s, and since then more research and analysis has
been made.

> A biblical reference to this is the Shibbolet story. At this point in
> Hebrew history, the TH (the second sound of the Shin letter) was falling
> out of the language and was becoming replaced by the S sound (which was
> carried on the Samek letter). Eventually, TH fell out completely and
> Shin now carries the SH sound and a redundant S sound

So, no.  The history of the sibilants is more complicated (more interesting)
than described here.  Thus, the Sin preserved in the letter Shin is not
related in any way to the merger of *th.  Also, the letter Sin and the letter
Samekh (and the sound of Shin) were all probably a little different back in
the second millenium BCE when these mergers took place:

samekh was pronounced as an affricate [ts].
sin was pronounced as a lateral fricative [ɬ].
shin was pronounced as an s sound [s].

You can read all about the evidence and its analysis here, in the article
by Robert Woodhouse:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_go2081/is_2_123/ai_n6292692/
"The Biblical Shibboleth Story in the Light of Late Egyptian Perceptions
of Semitic Sibilants: Reconciling Divergent Views", JAOS 123:2 (2003),
pp. 271-289.

Some of Woodhouse's bibliography can be read here:

Rendsburg:
"More on Hebrew Šibbōlet," Journal of Semitic Studies 33 (1988), pp. 255-258.
http://jewishstudies.rutgers.edu/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=60&Itemid=158

"The Ammonite Phoneme /T/," Bulletin of the American Schools of
Oriental Research 269 (1988), pp. 73-79.
http://jewishstudies.rutgers.edu/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=61&Itemid=158

Hendel:
"Sibilants and šibbōlet (Judges 12:6).” Bulletin of the American Schools of
Oriental Research 301 (1996) 69-75.
http://rshendel.googlepages.com/HendelSibilants.pdf

Yitzhak Sapir