Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com>]

> However, before the discussion is hijacked by a non-issue, it is
> also good to point out that accent shift is difficult to deal with in
> antiquity.
> We do know that Aramaic accent in the MT is different from BH
> accent in the MT.
> We also know that there were sub-standard dialect accents at the
> end of the Second Temple as demonstrated by some DSS Hebrew
> and BH texts where penultimate accents appear to have been
> used in some dialects.
>
> also, contrary to BH being conformed to MH, we have some evidence
> of Mishnaic Hebrew being conformed to BH. E.g., the spelling 'adan' in
> Mishnaic Hebrew for 'adam' has disappeared from printed texts.

Petr biqqesh:
"Could You, please, provide citation? Thank You!"


You need a concordance to Kaufmann ms of the MIshna. About 40
out of 400 are spelled alef-dalet-nun.
Unfortunately, my concordance is on microfiche and I don't have
a reader any more. The above is cited by memory from twenty years
but it's in the ballpark (reliably close).
The Hebrew Language Academy has this all online, though I don't
think that guest searches will turn this up.

So get a concordance to the Mishna and a copy of Kaufman, after
thirteen citations you will have a 75% chance of having found אדן.
That is: (%= 1-[.9x.9x.9 ...]).
An occurrence: Avot 1.6 ve-heve dan et kol ha-adan le-xaf zxut
'and be judging every man for good(acquital)'.
Kaufman reads "ha-adan" in this verse instead of ha-adam.

Incidentally, we see the higher sensitivity of Mishnaic Hebrew than
Biblical Hebrew to "grammatical aspect" in this verse.
This came as a result of close contact with Greek. Like many
things in Mishnaic Hebrew, it is not what people would have
imagined for a 'scholarly language'. It was a spoken low
language for several hundred years first, and distinct from a
synchronic high language BH.

--
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicalulpan.org
randallbuth AT gmail.com
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