Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Yitzhak:

On Fri, May 28, 2010 at 9:12 AM, Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>wrote:

> On Fri, May 28, 2010 at 2:03 AM, K Randolph wrote:
>
> >
> > This is an argument from silence, and this inscription may be the example
> > that shows it.
>
> The inscription can't be an example that shows it, because the reading is
> open
> to multiple interpretations.  The example that shows it has to be clear and
> unambiguous.


I know English is not your native tongue, and you do fairly well at it. But
in this case, you just said in different words the same point I made above.
If you meant this as a criticism, then that means you did not understand
what I wrote.

>
> I am going to add some more points to Randall's:
>
> 1) In the inscription, we see הגרזן אש.  In Biblical Hebrew, if אש was
> part of the גרזן, we would expect אש הגרזן.
>

Not necessarily. Depends on the context. In this context, I would not expect
it.

>
> 2) I generally read רעו in this inscription as plural, comparable to
> Biblical Hebrew
> רעיו.  The pronoun is still referring to a masculine noun.  This has
> to do with the
> particular situation in the event, where the diggers on one side are
> each digging
> towards all the diggers (רעים) on the other side, rather than being
> pitted digger
> on one side against digger on the other.
>

I have not been in the tunnel myself, but the photographs I have seen of it
indicate that it is so narrow that only one worker could be excavating at
the face of the excavation at a time. This contradicts your theory based on
linguistic knowledge alone.

>
> 3) The term לקרת comparable to Biblical Hebrew לקראת is used in the Bible
> only
> between individuals and nations and not between inanimate objects.
>

More likely it comes from the verb QRH which means, “to happen (upon), occur
⇒ to meet (with)”. This can fit inanimate objects as well.

In this context, it refers to the breakthrough, when the two teams met.

>
> 4) The word איש is used with the singular of רע (see point #2) many times,
> including 1 Sam 10:11, Gen 15:10, and many other examples.
>

Didn’t you see what I wrote below?

>
> So in the Bible, קל generally refers to a sound making entity where fire
> does
> not appear as a possibility,


Have you ever sat next to a fire in a quiet setting?

If this refers to the metal head of a pickax, do you mean to say that when
it struck the rock,that it was completely silent?

Experience indicates that the sound of the pickaxes hitting the rock could
travel meters through the rock, while human voices no more than a few
centimeters.


> לקראת refers to animate entities only, as does the
> word רע.


Dead are no longer animate, Genesis 15:10.

לקראת is not found on the Siloam inscription.


> > To be fair, after not finding the exact equivalent, I looked up )Y$ and
> R(HW
> > which usually, though not always, has a concept of reciprocity.
>
> …
> > What can we deduce from this inscription? The third line down, far left,
> > part of a word in a damaged section ends with -WBYM, along with MWC) and
> > MATYM indicating that the materes lectionis were used at the time the
> stone
> > was inscribed.
>
> Huh?
> ובים - and on the day, is purely consonantal.
>

Because of damage to the rock, you cannot make that a definite statement.


> מוצא - this may be an example of matres lectionis, especially one in the
> middle
> of the word, but this is not certain.
>

This is your presuppositions blinding you to what your eyes could otherwise
see.

>
> …R(W instead of R(HW indicates that spelling was not standardized,
>
> No, it indicates a different spelling than the Bible.
>

Along with the fact that sometimes in the Bible we find variant spellings
that are phonetic, most often in poetry.

>
> > A final thought that just crossed my mind as I prepared to close this
> > message, is it possible that the disputed )$ on this stone meant neither
> > “fire” nor “man”, rather is a form of the word Y$, which has alternate
> > spellings of both )$ and )Y$? And that its uses are not fully understood
> by
> > modern linguists? (Are both sides in this discussion wrong?)
>
> Practically all the points against אש - blade/fire in this inscription are
> valid
> against אש - 'is' (יש).  But where do you see יש לקראת or יש אל in the
> Bible?
>

How about Genesis 15:10 for starters?

>
> Yitzhak Sapir
>

Karl W. Randolph.