Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Jason Hare <jaihare AT gmail.com>]

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:28 AM, Steve Miller <smille10 AT sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> In Ps 22:17, if the correct reading is karu according to the 2 DSS witnesses
> + LXX, then is it possible to explain the extra aleph in the MT as a
> "prosthetic aleph"?
>
>
>
> The Pocket Dictionary for the Study of Biblical Hebrew by Todd J. Murphy
> defines a prosthesis as
>
> "The addition of a phoneme (usually a vowel) in BH and the Semitic languages
> to a word-initial consonant cluster in order to smooth pronunciation, which
> by itself tends to run contrary to the regular rules of Semitic
> pronunciation (e.g., BH zroa, "arm", becomes ezroa or zeroa). Prosthetic
> vowels compensate for a consonant cluster at the beginning of a word, and
> anaptyctic vowels compensate for consonant clusters at the end of a word.
> See also prosthetic aleph."
>
> Would the words surrounding kari in Ps 22:17 in MT qualify as a "consonant
> cluster"?
>

No, Steve. There's no need for the aleph to break anything here.
Notice that the vowel sound "a" already exists in the verb form כרו
KRW "they dug out." The aleph in this case isn't a phoneme at all,
since it adds nothing that wasn't already present in the verb itself.
It would serve only as a vowel letter.

We do find instances of aleph as a vowel letter in middle-weak verbs.
We could find קאמו instead of קמו, for example. But I don't know of
any instances of third-heh verbs taking such an aleph as a mater
lectionis, as it is suggested here.

Regards,
Jason Hare
Rehovot, Israel