Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

George Athas:
 
1.  You wrote:  “Where do you possibly see שׂער meaning ‘forest’? You 
simply have not nailed this down. There is a big difference between ‘hair’ 
and ‘wooded forest’. Until you can produce a firm linguistic connection 
there, you are either speculating at best, or just making it up.”
 
(a)  How do you call quoting BDB “just making it up”?  Here is what BDB 
says about %(YR:  ““the ‘hairy’, i.e. ‘well-wooded’. Cf. [the Arabic word 
for] trees”.
 
(b)  How is quoting Gesenius “just making it up”?  Gesenius sees %(YR as 
meaning “clothed, and, as it were, bristled with trees and thick woods”. 
 
(c)  How is citing Arabic cognate words, as referenced by BDB, “just making 
it up”?  The Arabic words for tree and trees sound a lot like “Seir”/%(YR: 
 “Tree = shajra;  Trees = shajar”.
 
Ishinan Ishibashi is immensely helpful in clarifying the Arabic cite, which 
should be to “sha`Ar (dense tangled trees; written with a medial `ayn) as 
mentioned in Brown-Driver-Briggs”.  [Thank you so much, Ishinan Ishibashi.  
Much appreciated.]
 
2.  You wrote:  “If there is a ghayin in שׂער then you would expect this 
reflected in cognate languages, such as Arabic, or in transliteration into 
other languages, such as Greek. But it isn’t. It just plain isn’t. So that 
theory is dead.”
 
I don’t think there is a ghayin in the Hebrew word %(YR.  That’s not what 
I said.  Rather, what I said was this:  “%(YR/Seir at Genesis 14: 6 probably 
comes from the Hurrian word $a(ri [with Hurrian variants thereon being $xri 
or $a-ax-ri], meaning “orchard”.  Fournet/Bomhard at p. 98.  Hurrian had 
no ayin as such, but it had a voiced velar fricative, which is probably 
equivalent to the archaic ghayin in Hebrew.  As such, this Hurrian letter for 
ghayin would be expected to come out in Biblical Hebrew as an ayin.  The 
closest possible Hebrew equivalent to Hurrian $a(ri/“orchard” would likely be 
$(YR or $(R, which in unpointed text is what we see at Genesis 14: 6.”
 
Let me now supplement my analysis there by talking a little bit more about 
Urartian, which I think will clarify this matter.  As background, Wikipedia 
states:  “Urartian is closely related to Hurrian, though not derived from 
it.  Although Urartian and Hurrian are related, it is now fairly clear that 
the two languages developed quite independently from the third millennium 
onwards.”
 
The Urartian word for “orchard” is sha-re.  It’s basically just like the 
Hurrian word for “orchard”, sha-a(-ri, except that the mysterious Hurrian 
ghayin has been dropped completely.  That suggests that the mysterious, 
rarely-used Hurrian ghayin did not have a strong sound, and in any event 
often was 
simply dropped by non-Hurrian peoples.  There likely was no exact e
quivalent in the Semitic languages to the elusive Hurrian ghayin.  Genesis 
14: 6 
took the route of taking note of that Hurrian ghayin, and representing it as 
an 
ayin in Hebrew (not as an archaic ghayin that almost sounded like a G).  
But not surprisingly, it seems that other non-Hurrian peoples in the Late 
Bronze Age simply dropped that mysterious Hurrian ghayin completely [as is 
the 
case with the Urartian cognate, sha-re].  Abdi-Heba of Jerusalem just says 
She-ru at Amarna Letter EA 288: 26.  This may be “the Urartian way” of 
dealing with this Hurrian word, simply dropping the ghayin/ayin.  On the 
other 
hand, Akkadian had no ayin, so this testimony alone is ambiguous as to the 
narrow issue of how to deal with the mysterious Hurrian ghayin.  [The ruler 
of 
Jerusalem had no dealings with a mountain south of the Dead Sea, whereas the 
important city of Seir just across the Jordan River in the hill country of 
the Transjordan was naturally of concern to Jerusalem.  So She-ru cannot be 
Mt. Seir south of the Dead Sea, but rather must be the important hill country 
city of Seir/Shar in the well-wooded Transjordan.]  The ruins at Jazer in 
the hill country of the Transjordan just east of the Jordan River are simply 
called Shar, with no ayin or ghayin.  This same city, which was the most 
important Late Bronze Age city in the Transjordanian hill country, shows up 
at 
item #22 on the mid-15th century BCE Thutmose III list as $R-N.  [There’s no 
ghayin or ayin, so the word actually looks closer to the Urartian version 
of this word than to the Hurrian;  the final –N is a suffix, either a west 
Semitic suffix meaning “place” or “town”, and/or a Hurrian suffix meaning “
the”.]  We know that city is in the Transjordan, because item #23 is Tubu in 
Amarna Letter EA 205: 3, which per Wm. Moran’s edition of the Amarna Letters 
at p. 392 is east of the Sea of Galilee, in the Transjordan;  and item #24 
is Busruna (Biblical Bezer + the commonplace, optional –N suffix), 
well-known in the Transjordan from Amarna Letters EA 197: 13 and EA 199: 13, 
with EA 
197 being full of Hurrian-type names and news from the Transjordan in 
traumatic Year 14 (of Akhenaten’s reign).  [$R-N at item #22 on the T III 
list 
cannot be the plain of Sharon, because no other items in that part of the T 
III 
list are close to the plain of Sharon.  Rather, the next two items are in 
the Transjordan, and the previous items are up north by Lebanon.]  
 
Chapter 14 of Genesis is generally acknowledged as being a Late Bronze Age 
composition, and as such a reference in such chapter to “Horites” must be 
to the historical Hurrians, whom everyone in the Late Bronze Age knew lived 
north of the Dead Sea.  Genesis 14: 5 is obviously referencing the 
Transjordan, so the references to Seir and Horites at Genesis 14: 6 must then 
logically be referring to the Hurrians in the well-wooded hill country of the 
Transjordan at Seir.  Since the Hurrians are closely associated with the 
Transjordan at Genesis 14: 6 and in Amarna Letter EA 197, it makes sense that 
the 
name “Seir”/Shar would derive from a Hurrian word meaning “orchard”, and mean 
“well-wooded”.
 
3.  You wrote:  “[P]lease stop trying our collective patience with these 
way-out theories that have little factual basis.”
 
When a theory is based on BDB, Gesenius, Arabic cognate words, a Hurrian 
cognate word, a Urartian cognate word, and attestations on the T III list, in 
the Amarna Letters, and in truly ancient chapter 14 of Genesis as to a Late 
Bronze Age city located in the “well-wooded” hill country of the 
Transjordan just east of the Jordan River, how does such a theory constitute 
a “
way-out theory” that “tries our collective patience”?  I have shown 
overwhelming 
objective evidence from the secular history of the Late Bronze Age that 
there was an important city called Seir, often as not spelled without any 
ayin 
as Shar, in the well-wooded hill country of the Transjordan.  It would make 
perfect sense for the name of that city to mean “orchard” in Hurrian and “
well-wooded” in west Semitic.  Why would such a city be called “hairy”?  Item 
#22 on the Thutmose III list, Amarna Letter EA 288: 26 from Abdi-Heba of 
Jerusalem (with “Heba” being the name of a Hurrian goddess), and Genesis 14: 
6 are all Late Bronze Age evidence for the city of Seir/Shar in the “
well-wooded” hill country of the Transjordan.  BDB, Gesenius, Arabic cognate 
words, 
a Hurrian cognate word, a Urartian cognate word, and common sense all 
strongly suggest that the meaning of “Seir”/Shar in the well-wooded hill 
country 
of the Transjordan was:  “Well-Wooded”. 
 
Why try to deny the historical and linguistic facts, when those objective 
facts fully support the pinpoint historical accuracy of the “four kings 
against five” at Genesis 14: 1-11?  In particular, the Late Bronze Age Hebrew 
author of chapter 14 of Genesis certainly knew his geography, with precision. 
 
The “Horites” at Genesis 14: 6 are the historical Hurrians, whom we know 
from Amarna Letter EA 197 historically lived in the Transjordan, with Genesis 
14: 6 specifying that, not surprisingly, some of those Hurrians lived at and 
near the most important Late Bronze Age city in the well-wooded hill 
country city of the Transjordan:  Seir/Shar.  If you want  p-i-n-p-o-i-n-t  
historical accuracy in the Bible, where virtually every word in the text is 
attested in the well-documented secular history of the Bronze Age, Genesis 
14: 5-7 
is that text.  Here, I have shown that there was an important Late Bronze 
Age city called Seir/Shar in the well-wooded hill country of the western 
Transjordan, where Hurrians historically lived.  That is the city that is 
being 
referenced in connection with the Horites/Hurrians, with pinpoint historical 
accuracy in a Late Bronze Age context, at Genesis 14: 6, as Seir. 
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois