Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Fred:

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 3:44 PM, fred burlingame <tensorpath AT gmail.com>wrote:

> I am saying that language comprehension does not come in a fixed container
> or packet, but rather exists on a continuum. Some people have first grade
> language skill; some people have high school language skill; and some
> people
> enjoy graduate school language skill.
>

You must have a very low opinion as to the intelligence employed by the
average ancient Israelite in his language comprehension. Almost all the
vocabulary and concepts mentioned in Deuteronomy were from daily use, no
more difficult than expected from high school students. Compared to some of
the other books in Tanakh, Deuteronomy is rather simple and straight
forward, making your paragraph above appropriate ..... not.

We moderns, on the other hand, have two additional difficulties: 1) we no
longer inhabit their world, so reading Deuteronomy brings us in contact with
concepts with which we are unfamiliar, and 2) some of the terminology has
been forgotten, so we moderns are guessing as to their meaning and
understanding. These are modern difficulties, not in any way to be applied
to a study of Biblical Hebrew in its understanding by its original audience.

>
> …
> And I am saying, as I said before, that most consumers of the Code, then
> and
> now, enjoy not the level of language skill that david possesses;


How do you know? Where is your data? This sounds like a presupposition, not
a conclusion based on knowledge and research.


> or that is
> possessed by the Code.


See above. Apparently you have not read the whole of Tanakh?


>
> regards,
>
> fred burlingame
>

Karl W. Randolph.