Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com>]

On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 3:34 AM, Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 11:07 PM, Randall Buth wrote:
>
>> 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.
>
> Images of the fragment are available on the internet due to its
> proximity to Ps 22:17, which is a heavy point of debate.
>
> Here are two:
> http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php?title=Psalms_22:16&redirect=no
>
> Karl apparently doesn't see that the Waw connects with the Aleph
> and is therefore longer.  Note that the Aleph's left leg has a "serif"
> going to the right and down, unlike all other Alephs...
>
> I don't know why you give Karl the benefit that yr)y by is possible.
> I do not see how it is possible at all.

shalom Yitzhak,

thank you for the ms reference/picture.
I was not referring to the DS manuscript but to general Hebrew
structure.

It is possible to read (that is, 'to interpret')
a smixut noun on a prepositional phrase, as in the phrase
e.g., kol Hosey-bo  'all refuge-finders-of-in-him'.

However, while the structure is possible, the semantics are NOT
a good reading, since only ra'a "he saw" normallly takes a b-
preposition for its object, and that for a specific idiom meaning to
'boast in victory over'. Consequently, without even looking at the
manuscript, I would read this as hemma yabbiTu, yir'u vi
'they will watch, they will gloat over me in victory'
(or some such similar English). And even if the yod
and vav were not clear in that particular manuscript,
I would read it that way. Reading handwriting is partially by what
is written and partially by what makes sense. Every letter in
a handwritten text does not need to be clear, as we prove everyday
in any language when we scribble off a note to someone.

PS: I also renamed the thread because these comments do not
refer to the issue of using the MT vowels for internalization a
dialect of Hebrew, but refers to a specific reading of Psalm 22:18.

Randall Buth


>
> Yitzhak Sapir
>
>>
>> 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
>> Biblical Language Center
>> Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life
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>>
>



-- 
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicalulpan.org
randallbuth AT gmail.com
Biblical Language Center
Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life