Biblical Hebrew Forum

[fred burlingame <tensorpath AT gmail.com>]

Hello Yigal;

I am not sure what you mean by serious? but ....

a. don't the sages and the medieval writers both claim the post
exilic aramaic script as the original lettering of the language? and
notwithstanding the prior letters (alphabet) of the siloam inscription,
etc.? that conclusion seems a fairly strong attestation of linguistic
uniqueness.

b. don't a lot of people who consider themselves mainstream (bankers,
barbers and bakers) ..... accept the claim that codes are written into the
tanakh lettering?

c. isn't the attitude of most mainstream people who engage in worship on the
weekend; "if that's what the man in the pulpit says; ... that's the facts we
go with?" isn't much of what happens in the religious services on the
weekend, the claim of linguistic uniqueness to the language?

d. i haven't conducted a survey, but i suspect that lots of people who
participate in this forum, make that claim of linguistic uniqueness.

e. i advocate no theology here ... one way or the other. but the suggestion
that 99.9 percent of serious people (be they linguists or relative lay
persons) claim the linguistic commonness of the biblical hebrew
language, represents in my humble opinion ... reality ... not.

regards,

fred burlingame

On Tue, Jan 4, 2011 at 1:48 PM, Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il> wrote:

> Fred, very few serious people, including the sages of the Talmud or the
> Medieval Jewish writers, have claimed that Hebrew was LINGUISTICALLY unique.
> On the contrary, they routinely cited parallels in related languages.
> Hebrew's status as a "holy tongue" is based on the belief that God chose to
> reveal his word in that language, perhaps even to create the world in it.
> But that belief is beyond the purview of this list.
>
> Yigal Levin
>
>
>