Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Initial Consonant Clusters in Biblical Hebrew

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: JimStinehart AT aol.com
  • To: yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com, b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Initial Consonant Clusters in Biblical Hebrew
  • Date: Fri, 11 Jun 2010 17:35:00 EDT


Yitzhak Sapir:

You wrote: “Ka-$ra is not an initial consonant cluster, and Akkadian,
Hebrew, and even Arabic have no problem with a form ‘[ka-$ra’.”

Hello, hello! No way.

In Biblical Hebrew and in the Akkadian of the Amarna Letters, not a single
syllable consisting of $R + vowel is attested, to the best of my knowledge.

1. For starters, I have personally checked every Biblical Hebrew word
whose first two letters are shin/$ resh/R. Not a single one of those words
is
thought to start with a single syllable containing both the shin/$ and the
resh/R. Typical here is a word like $R$ [e.g. Deuteronomy 29: 18], which is
divided into syllables as $ - R$, and is not divided into syllables as $R - $
[nor is it a one-syllable word $R$]. Consider also $RH [Job 37: 3], which
predictably is divided into syllables as $ - RH [not as $R – H or $RH].

2. In looking at interior syllables, I found 7 Biblical Hebrew words of
interest. The most exciting actually looks quite a bit like ka-$ra! It’s
KW$RH at Psalms 68: 6. But here is how it’s divided into syllables: KW - $
-
RH.

Perhaps the next most exciting word of this general type is X$RH at II
Samuel 22: 12. There is no vowel implied between the $ and R. But the
syllable
division is: X$ - RH.

The other 5 words of this general type that I found are as follows: (i)
K$RWN = K$ - RWN. [3 times in Ecclesiastes] (ii) $RWN = $ - RWN. [E.g.
Isaiah 33: 9. Interestingly, this is the only one of these 7 words that is
not
a word that is only rarely used in the Bible.] (iii) M$RH = M$ - RH.
[Numbers 6: 3] (iv) M$R(Y = M$ - R( - Y. [I Chronicles 2: 53] (v) Q$RYM =
Q$ -
RYM. [Isaiah 3: 20 and Jeremiah 2: 32]

Thus although those 7 words had the possibility of a discrete single
syllable being $R + vowel [or possibly $R + vowel + additional consonant, as
a
single syllable], in not a single case is that the situation.

3. Turning now to Akkadian, I have scrolled through dozens and dozens of
Amarna Letters in Akkadian, looking at syllables with shin/$. I see $ar all
the time, and sometimes $e-ru. But I have never found a discrete syllable
that is -$ra- [or any other vowel after $r in a single syllable].

Akkadian has a lot of words that look something like ka-$ru: ka$aru,
_ki$ertu_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kiertu&language=rawakkadian)
, _ku$īru_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kuīru&lan
guage=rawakkadian) , _ku$urra_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kuurra+'+u&language=rawakkadian)
,
_ki$irtu_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kiirtu&language=rawakkadian)
, _ku$āru_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kuār
u&language=rawakkadian) , _ku$artu_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kuartu&language=rawakkadian)
,
_ka$du_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kadu&language=rawakkadian)
, ka$adu, _ki$ru_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kiru&;
language=rawakkadian) , _ku$īru_
(http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/cuneiform.languages/dictionary/dosearch.php?searchkey=kuīru&language=rawakkadian)

. But note that ka$aru has an express vowel between the $ and R. As to
ki$ru [meaning “to bind”], if it’s a 2-syllable word, it’s ki$-ru, or if it’s
a 3-syllable word, it’s ki-$a-ru. [Compare Q$R at Isaiah 49: 18, meaning “
to bind”: ka-$ar.] Never does one see a discrete syllable composed of $ra
or $ru, etc. No, either there’s a vowel between the $ and R, or else the $
ends the preceding syllable, and the R starts a new syllable.

4. I am not insisting that a Hebrew or Akkadian-speaker could not
pronounce a syllable as $ra. But I am saying that such a syllable is not
attested
in the Hebrew Bible, and I myself have never found such a syllable in the
Amarna Letters either.

Accordingly, faced with Ka-$ra in Kassite, it is predictable that such
portion of the Kassite name of Kassite Babylonia came out as Ka-ra in the
Amarna
Letters sent from Babylon. It also makes perfect sense that the Hebrew
author of the Patriarchal narratives decided to have the Hebrew version of
the
Kassite name of Kassite Babylonia start with Ka-$a. That let his readers
know that this was the homeland of the Ka$-$u people, the Kassites. Neither
decision was “wrong”. We moderns might have expected Ka-$a-ra, but that
would have turned a 2-syllable component of this country’s name into 3
syllables, and that was not acceptable. So the name starts out Ka-ra in
Akkadian,
and Ka-$a in Hebrew, with the Kassites’ original version having been Ka-$ra.

5. If you know a single syllable, in the form of $R + vowel [and there
could be an additional consonant at the end], whether an interior syllable or
otherwise, where such syllable is pronounced as one syllable, and there is no
implied vowel either before or after the shin/$, in either Hebrew or
Akkadian, please set it forth. I myself am unaware of any such linguistic
phenomenon. But I come here to learn, like everyone else. If you were right
that “
Akkadian, Hebrew…have no problem with a form ‘ka-$ra’”, then my theory of
the Bible would have a major gap. But I do not see where you have set
forth any instance of $ra as a single syllable in either Biblical Hebrew or
Akkadian, nor do I see any reason to think that such a syllable would be
likely
in either language.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page