Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

Uri Hurwitz wrote:  “The Canaanite glosses in the Amarna letters demonstrate


clearly that a  living west-Semitic language was known to the authors, and 
that such a language was in use. Aren't some of these glosses words which 
are found in the Hebrew bible?  Surely they are few a number, but sufficient 
to


indicate the linguistic background of the HB.”
 
Wm. Moran’s Index at p. 378 lists 40 west Semitic words that he discusses 
regarding the Amarna Letters.  (These are only the west Semitic words that 
are somewhat troublesome, to the point that Moran discusses them in the 
footnotes, rather than being anywhere close to all the west Semitic words in 
the 
Amarna Letters.  But it is a convenient listing of 40 west Semitic words 
concerning the Amarna Letters.)  In this post, we’ll take a glance at the 
first 
5 words on this list of 40 words.  Do all these words appear in the 
Patriarchal narratives?
 
1.  (BD, a very common Hebrew word meaning “to serve” or “servant”, such 
as at Genesis 49: 15.
 
2.  a-ni-[_]a is compared by Moran to )NYH in Hebrew, a word that appears 
at Genesis 49: 13 [and Jonah 1: 3], in all cases meaning “boat” or “ship”.  
[In this case, and many others, scholars split as to exactly what is 
written in the Amarna Letter in question and/or what it means.  Moran is 
listing 
precisely those west Semitic words in the Amarna Letters that have caused 
scholarly comment, while he omits most non-controversial west Semitic words 
whose writing and meaning are not questionable.]
 
3.  anu is listed by Moran, but the text says a-na-yi, meaning “boat”, 
which is the same as #2 above.
 
4.  (sara or xasiri or (siri.  Moran sees all of them as being equivalent 
to Hebrew (CR, meaning “to confine, stay, restrain”.  For example, Genesis 
20: 18.
 
Note how Moran routinely assumes that if it’s a Canaanite word in the 
Amarna Letters, there’s likely to be a direct Biblical equivalent.  It’s 
painfully obvious that Northwest Semitic was a fully-developed language of 
longstanding as of the mid-14th century BCE.  What scholars are constantly 
arguing 
about is the rather esoteric issue of whether any given old Northwest Semitic 
word or writing is or is not “Hebrew”, as opposed to being a cognate 
language not in the direct line of Hebrew.  Though that esoteric issue is 
important to scholars, for our purposes here isn’t it obvious that Abraham 
could 
have effortlessly talked to the west Semitic-speaking princelings in mid-14th 
century BCE Canaan?  The Canaanite words they put in their Amarna Letters 
keep showing up in the Patriarchal narratives, as we are seeing.  So far, all 
four words noted by Moran are right there, big as life, in the received text 
of the Patriarchal narratives.
 
5.  (z, a Biblical Hebrew word which Moran contrasts with the first word in 
the phrase that actually appears in the Amarna Letters:  i-na pa-ni-$u-nu.  
Moran cites Deuteronomy 28: 50 and other Biblical cites as a way of 
explaining this “Canaanite idiom”, which has i-na instead of the Biblical 
word 
that Moran expects, (Z.  This same word, (Z, appears at Genesis 49: 3, 7.
 
As it turns out, this list of Moran’s 40 west Semitic words appears to be 
basically words that appear in the Patriarchal narratives that Moran has had 
occasion to discuss in connection with Canaanite words that appear in the 
Amarna Letters.  It’s obvious that Moran assumes that if he sees a Canaanite 
word in the Amarna Letters, he expects that he will usually see a direct 
equivalent to that word in the Patriarchal narratives.  If a west Semitic 
word 
in the Amarna Letters has no direct equivalent in the Bible, Moran is quick 
to label such an unusual occurrence a “Canaanite idiom”, i.e., a west 
Semitic phrase that’s not in the Bible.  My guess is that if we looked at the 
other 35 words on this list, and also the non-controversial other Canaanite 
words that appear in the Amarna Letters, we would find that a majority, and 
perhaps even most, such words appear in the Patriarchal narratives.
 
The princelings in Canaan may not have been able to write good Akkadian in 
their Amarna Letters.  But based on the Canaanite words in the Amarna 
Letters,  those princelings could easily have conversed with Abraham, using 
the 
vocabulary of the Patriarchal narratives. 
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois