Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

George:

On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 9:59 PM, George Athas 
<George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>wrote:

> Karl,
>
> None of those references are sufficient to count as sustained meaningful
> contact. First of all, 1 Kgs 10.24 says that the whole world came to hear
> Solomon. Do you think that is literal?


How much ancient travel was there? Can we absolutely rule out that people
came from all over the world?


> If so, is there evidence of loanwords into Hebrew from every single
> language at the time?


You’ve got to be kidding with this question. When Tanakh preserved only a
fraction of Hebrew as it was then spoken, would you expect it to preserve
all the loan words? And how many loan words stuck, i.e. remained in the
language?

As it is, there is only one loanword and that from a nearby language,
concerning a particular type of royal construction. In other words,
concerning something that Solomon would have built.


> This is just not convincing. And we are not talking about one word. There
> are at least two (though you deny one of them through a very odd etymology)


I said nothing about an etymology. I mentioned a context. A context which
indicates that this is a noun with a third person plural suffix. If the
context is followed, then this is not a loanword from Persian. If not a
loanword from Persian, then it is a happax legomenon whose meaning has long
been forgotten.


> , both of which point to the influence of a Persian elite/administration.


Who do you think among the Persians who would have built a PRDS if not the
elite? And who most likely would have travelled from Persia to Jerusalem
during Solomon’s time if not the elite?


> And yet, Solomon, out of all the multitudes who came to have an audience
> with him, singled out the (at the time) relatively insignificant Persians


How insignificant were they? Or is it more accurate that we should mention
both the Medes and the Persians, as they then formed two branches of the
same people and language?


> and chose two of their words that had to do with royal
> prestige/administration (even though the Persians were relatively
> insignificant), modified them through Aramaic, and then years later used
> them in Hebrew to describe what he'd done years before in a book that
> doesn't even bear his name? Yes, of course that's *possible*, Karl. But if
> you c
>  an't even admit the possibility that maybe, just maybe, the loanwords made
> their way into Hebrew (and other languages) during the Persian Era, then I
> don't think you're being open to evidence, and we have nothing further to
> discuss.
>
> I see language and literary structure consistent with a Solomaic
authorship. I see historical references, several, in the book itself that
fit only Solomon. I see historical references, several, from other books
that both back up the historical references in this book and give reason why
one Persian word could have been adopted by Solomon. And against all of
these, I am to take one clear loanword as evidence that all these other
evidences are wrong?

>
>
Regards,
>
> GEORGE ATHAS
> Moore Theological College (Sydney, Australia)
> www.moore.edu.au
>

I think all the evidence needs to be taken into account and weighed, and
right now the majority by far of the evidence that I see indicates that
Solomon was the author of Qohelet. Against this multitude of evidence, you
produce only a few counter arguments, counter arguments that can be
explained by that majority, and say that they trump the majority. My
response is that they don’t.

To me, it looks as if you are clinging to straws.

Karl W. Randolph.