Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com>]

Garth,
I would like to commend your point about the MT vowels being a good
starting point.
It is important for a Hebrew learner to internalize the language in one
consistent dialect and the MT provides the most complete
recording of a dialect in organic, continual use by a community.
There are other reasons that support the choice
of the MT, but that is sufficient to make it a recommended starting point.

As for reading unpointed texts, the most important thing is to learn
the language so well that a word pops into place with only the
underdifferentiated consonant text.  A person may compare the
email that circulates where people read an English text even though
the internal letters of the word are scrambled. The brain pops a word
into place long before a person has unscrambled or justified such a
reading. the same thing happens when reading unpointed Semitic
texts. The key is thorough internatization, and I'm not sure if that
can be fully or appropriately done without some dialect being
internalized. I'm not sure that 'training wheels' are a very good
comparison. For one, as you've mentioned, the MT records the
official synagogue reading/interpretation, and that is sufficient
enough reason to want perpetual access, whether one agrees
with a particular reading, or not. Secondly, the internalization
of a language takes a very long time, usually quite a bit longer than
the learner expects. The points are necessary for the learner to
get the language inside of them. I've heard far too many people
learning modern Hebrew as adults who are sloppy in their language
use because they have learned the language thru unvocalized
texts before their ears were accurately 'laying down' the language
in their head. On the other hand, if a learner does a good job with
the points they will be able to read unvocalized texts without
any problem and even 'more accurately' than many a mother-
tongue speaker. E.g., ani maniaH "I assume" is far too frequently
heard as ani meniaH. [Just a pet pieve.] One does not learn to
read unpointed Hebrew by just reading ujpointed Hebrew. One
first learns the language, then one reads unpointed Hebrew. Quite
similarly to the English reading example' mentioned. One does
not learn to read that by reading such scrambled English. One
learns English, then one can read the scrambled English.

Then sensitive ears/eyes can deal with the MT. A couple of examples:
Is 53.5 ובחברתו uvaHavurato of the MT is without a dagesh in the
bet and should probably be read as 'in his group'. The MT has
apparently gone against the reading Habbura "wound, weal", even
though it fits the poetry and is what the LXX translators chose.

The reading brought up of Ps 22:18 strikes me strange. yar'ey
bi is not a smooth reading (smixut+preposition-- while possible,
it is not the expected preposition with yare, as if 'fearers of-because
-of-me'), while the idiom with yir'u bi "they will see their victory over
me" is classic. Anyway, like the 'reading ability' mentioned with
scrambled English, I would probably even read a Qumran text
that appeared to be y.r.'.y. b.y as yir'u bi because y and w in the
Qumran script are notoriously interchanged. It reminds me of how I
read the newspaper without bothering to put on glasses. d and r,
b and k blur in my eyesight, but I just read the text anyway. Most
of the time one doesn't need to re-read or re-look, or get one's
glasses.

the bottom line is that written texts are underdifferentiated by
their nature and that a language is not the graphic system that
partially records the language. A language, and valid for any
language, is the complete system that forms in users heads.
For BH the most complete dialect of BH in unbroken continuity with
using communities is recommended as the best starting point.
Even though BH became first a 'high language' to a diglossia and
then a second language to a community, BH is not like Ugaritic or
Phoenician where the language lost a continuous using community
and needed 100% reconstruction/decipherment. Continuous use
means that organic change can be backtracked should one wish,
as opposed to "reconstruction" which is artificial and dependent on
the skill of the reconstructor.

So students would do well to learn the morphology of BH thru
the MT and to internalize it  'all the way'. then they will read the
biblical text whether pointed or unpointed and will be sensitive to
other readings or interpretations, whether with or against the MT.

braxot
Randall Buth

-- 
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicalulpan.org
randallbuth AT gmail.com
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