Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

In my prior post, I showed how $H at the beginning of $H-DW-T) makes sense 
as a reference to the Hurrian sky-god Tessup, using Sanskrit words, which 
was the “Hurrian way” of creating important proper names at NHRYM.  [Laban is 
stated at Genesis 24: 10 to live at NHRYM, which is the word, attested only 
in the Amarna Letters, for the Hurrian state of Nahrima/Mitanni in 
northeast Syria.]  Now let’s analyze the rest of the word $H-DW-T), and then 
we’ll 
look at the whole phrase, YGR $H-DW-T).
 
Data is from Sanskrit da, where da-ti in Sanskrit means “to give”.  But 
the Hurrian version of the Sanskrit word “da” was “du”, meaning “to give”.  
[Alternatively, the W might be a mere vowel indicator, not necessarily 
changing the Sanskrit “da” to Hurrian “du”.]  The ending seems to be –tta, 
which means “I” or “me” in Hurrian as a suffix.
 
The meaning of $H-DW-T) is:  “(The) sky [that is, the all-important Hurrian 
sky-god Tessup] give I (as witness).”  On the foregoing analysis, every 
single letter in the Hebrew text is perfect.
 
We know that Abdi-Heba and (YN $W [at item #5 on the Thutmose III list] 
have the Late Bronze Age pattern of a Hebrew word followed by a Hurrian word. 
 
Using that pattern, with YGR being the Hebrew word [not an Aramaic word] for 
“fear”, YGR $H-DW-T) at Genesis 31: 47 now makes perfect historical sense. 
 It means:
 
 “Fear (of) sky [that is, the all-important Hurrian sky-god Tessup] give I 
(as witness)”.
 
[The ultra-literal translation is:  “fear sky give I”.]  Although a 
different Hebrew word for “fear” is used, note that Jacob reacts to the 
foregoing 
polytheistic name at Genesis 31: 53 by swearing by the “fear” of Isaac, 
that is, the pious fear that all three Patriarchs righteously had for YHWH, 
as 
the one and only God (in the view of the Hebrews, as opposed to the pagan 
views of polytheistic Laban).
 
I disagree with the (seemingly unanimous) scholarly view expressed by Dr. 
Reinhard G. Lehmann that, allegedly, “In this text, two (fictitious) persons…
try  


to say the same thing in different languages.”  No, Laban and Jacob are  
n-o-t  saying the same thing, nor is Laban speaking Aramaic (a language that 
did not exist yet in the Patriarchal Age).  Laban of NHYRM is swearing by the 
pagan Hurrian sky-god Tessup.  Pious, monotheistic Jacob/“Israel” would 
never do anything remotely like that!
 
I also disagree with Prof. Lehmann’s statement that “the Aramaic wording 
and the possibilities of rendering are no device for a dating of the text.”  
There is no “Aramaic wording” in the Patriarchal narratives.  But the 
slightly-concealed reference to the Hurrian sky-god Tessup at Genesis 31: 47 
dates the text beautifully.  The  o-n-l-y  time in 5,000 years of human 
history 
when both (i) the Hurrian sky-god Tessup was known and prominent, and (ii) 
the Hebrews were historically in existence, was the 14th century BCE.  That’s 
also the dating of the only attestations of NHRYM, and of the phrase “field 
of the Arameans”/Paddan-Aram.  Likewise, the only attestation in secular 
history of Chedorlaomer’s kingly title (in the original, defective spelling), 
MLK (LM, as applied to an historical ruler is in the 14th century BCE.  
George Athas has properly stated that whether the names match is a critical 
aspect of whether a theory of the Patriarchal narratives is bona fide.  
There’s 
no way that a Hebrew or Jew in the 1st millennium BCE would think to 
reference the long-extinct Hurrian sky-god Tessup (using Sanskrit words, no 
less!), 
or the long-extinct Hurrian state of NHRYM.  University scholars have no 
explanation for the presence of NHRYM in this text, and no decent explanation 
for the presence of YGR $H-DW-T) in this text.





In a later post, we can confirm most all of the foregoing analysis of 
$H-DW-T) by looking at a Hurrian princeling name from this very time period 
that 
is a close variant of the Biblical foreign name [which is  n-o-t  Aramaic]:  
$H-DW-T).
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois