Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Randall:

On Fri, Sep 4, 2009 at 4:17 PM, Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com> wrote:

> vayyixtov David
>
> Maybe I should add a third testimony:
> there is a story about Judah ha-Nasi's maid who made comments in Hebrew
> … The maid,
> by the way, turns out to be bilingual because she also made an Aramaic
> comment in
> another story and context, though with the same principle being extracted
> --
> interpretation is according to normal language use. The passages were
> not arguing
> for a language per se, they become incidental testimony again pointing
> to Hebrew
> being known by commoners, and in this case a servant woman who knew words
> and phrases that were not known by the rabbis in that center (200CE+).
>
> blessings
> Randall
>
> --
> Randall Buth, PhD
> www.biblicalulpan.org
> randallbuth AT gmail.com
> Biblical Language Center
> Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life


We discussed her before, and the conclusion we reached is that we know too
little about her, her background, how long she had been a maid where she
heard Hebrew being spoken, etc. We have to leave open the possibility that
she learned Hebrew while working for Judah ha Nasi. When we leave that
possibility open, then her story is just an interesting story, not proof
that Hebrew was anything more than spoken in the same manner as medieval
Latin.

Karl W. Randolph.