Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Arnaud Fournet" <fournet.arnaud AT wanadoo.fr>]

From: JimStinehart AT aol.com


Dr. Fournet:

1.  You wrote:  “…an affricate [ts]…should be rendered by Samekh which was 
also an affricate [ts] at that time.  Tsade means that this word cannot be 
Hurrian.”

Scholars have varying opinions about that.  Richard Steiner is famous for 
arguing that Hebrew tsade was an affricate in ancient times:
“Other works on Hebrew phonology include Cardona (1968) on the historical 
development of the tsade and Steiner (1977), who discussed the case for 
fricative laterals in Proto-Semitic.  Steiner (1983) argues that the 
affricate pronunciation of tsade in Hebrew and Aramaic is not a late 
Ashkenazic development but is an ancient variant of the fricative [s] 
pronunciation….”  Nahum M. Waldman, “The Recent Study of Hebrew” (1989), at 
p. 20.
***
I would readily agree on this hypothesis about Proto-Semitic and early 
Hebrew.
A.
***



In the dozens of Hurrian names that appear in the Patriarchal narratives,
***
No
This is not an argument but your hypothesis, which you cannot circularly use 
as an argument, not until it's proved.
A.
***



C/tsade is sometimes used, but S/Samekh is never used even a single time. 
Chapter 14 of Genesis is often considered to be older than most of the rest 
of the Bible, so it is possible that its author used early Hebrew C/tsade to 
record a Hurrian affricate,
***
It's not possible phonetically.
If the word is originally Hurrian, then it cannot contain any emphatics, as 
stated before several times. Period.
A.
***



even if other Biblical authors, centuries later, might not have used C/tsade 
in that way.  Moreover, Gelb and Purves at p. 6 of “Nuzi Personal Names” 
refer to “the interchange of tsade and z values”.  One of your 
transliterations of xa-tsi-tsi is xa-zi-zi, with Z, and per Gelb and Purves, 
Hurrian Z could interchange with tsade.
***
ok, they indeed write that at the bottom of p.6.
But there is still a general methodological problem with your approach.
You keep confusing graphic issues with phonetic issues.
Basically your claim is that because Cuneiform is a rather approximative 
system that does not provide a clear-cut distinction between ts, dz and 
tsade which are laxly written as z, which is a graphic issue about 
Cuneiform, then we should accept that a real phoneme [ts] (allegedly in 
Hurrian) would be laxly rendered and written as tsade in Hebrew, when it is 
clear that Hebrew is written in a precise alphabet, that would never write a 
non-emphatic phoneme with an emphatic letter. To put it short, your 
reasoning is completely flawed. The situation about Cuneiform being 
approximative has nothing to do with that of Hebrew where the alphabet 
provides a precise phonetic grid for consonants.
A.
***



2.  The Hurrian suffix –nni would be spelled –N in Biblical Hebrew.  Doubled 
consonants in Hurrian routinely are represented by a single consonant in 
Hebrew in the Patriarchal narratives.
***
this is not an argument but your unproved hypothesis.
A.
***


3.  The Hurrians focused on the number nine in their primeval mythology. 
Here’s a snippet:
The Hurrian primeval myth “‘Kingship in Heaven’ begins with the reign of 
Alalu in heaven;  after nine years, he was overthrown by Anu (Sky) and went 
down to the "dark earth";  Anu ruled for nine years and then was attacked by 
Kumarbi and fled to the sky….”  Richard S. Caldwell, “The Origin of the 
Gods” (1993), at p. 82.
***
Thanks.
I'll check that issue more extensively.
A.
***



Accordingly, the Hurrian culture may be the only culture where the following 
city name would make sense:  “Wisdom-the Nine”.  The Hurrians’ “wisdom” 
concerning primeval matters centered on the number “nine”.  The expected 
spelling of “Wisdom-the Nine” in Hurrian is xa-tsi-tsi-ni tam-ri.  The early 
Biblical Hebrew rendering of that Hurrian city name would, subject to the 
open question of how to represent a Hurrian affricate in early Hebrew, be 
expected to be XCC-N TMR, which is exactly what we see at Genesis 14: 7, 
letter-for-letter.
***
No
Consonants hardly match and the situation is even worse for vowels, not to 
speak about syntax as we discussed before.

Arnaud Fournet