Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

James Christian wrote:  “Sorry. What did you say? Could you say that again?”
 
The word %HDWT) at Genesis 31: 47 does not appear as an Aramaic word with 
that initial sin/% spelling in the secular history of the ancient world until 
after 200 BCE.  Plus, YGR %HDWT) is much longer than its supposedly 
equivalent phrase GL(D in Hebrew, though Hebrew and Aramaic are cognate 
languages;  
the Aramaic word GDR would be a closer Aramaic equivalent to the Hebrew 
word GL than is YGR [and YGR may well be the Hebrew word “fear”];  and if 
Aramaic, &HDWT) would include the word “the”, unlike GL(D.  Given all the 
many 
problems with an Aramaic analysis of YGR %HDWT), we should do what no 
university scholar apparently has ever done:  ask if %HDWT) makes sense in 
the 
language used for proper names at the place where Laban [who is the person 
who 
says YGR %HDWT) in the Bible] is stated at Genesis 24: 10 to live -- NHRYM.  
Biblical NHRYM is an exact, letter for letter match to na-ah-ri-ma by 
Abdi-Heba of Jerusalem in Amarna Letter EA 288: 35.  NHRYM references 
Nahrima/Mitanni, the Late Bronze Age Hurrian state just northeast of the 
upper 
Euphrates River, where Laban is portrayed as living.  The historicity of the 
Patriarchal narratives is riding on this linguistic issue, because written 
Aramaic 
is not attested prior to the 9th century BCE, many centuries after any 
historical Patriarchal Age.  In 2004, Yigal Levin suggested that %HDWT) may 
be “
Hebraized” Aramaic, but why would a Hebrew or Jewish author in the 1st 
millennium BCE use a non-attested Aramaic word, while having 
letter-for-letter 
pinpoint accuracy as to a word, NHRYM, that is not attested in secular 
history 
after the mid-14th century BCE?  If the Patriarchal narratives are an 
accurate, Bronze Age composition (my view), then %HDWT) should be analyzed in 
the 
way I will do on this thread:  on the non-Aramaic basis of the language that 
historically was used for important proper names at the Late Bronze Age 
Hurrian state of NHRYM.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois