Biblical Hebrew Forum

[fred burlingame <tensorpath AT gmail.com>]

Hello Isaac:

Thanks for your comments.

Let me see if i understand.


A. When your very young relative spontaneously announces to you, her desire
for ice cream, she proves the following facts.

1. אבה , (ah-va), strong's concordance number 14 equates with בוא ,
(bo), strong's number 935, via the identity of meaning in root letter ב
(bet)?

2. Ancient hebrew enjoys equivalence with modern hebrew language on a basic
and fundamental level involving single letter roots?

3. Spoken language informs the written language (writing system) in a manner
that the latter cannot do alone?

B. If we wish to learn the etymology of any hebrew word, (and of equal
import, the meaning of single letter roots), we need to engage the following
process.

1. Ignore or discount what you call "fillers;" what others call "vowels,"
...  א ע ה ; and focus on the consonants?

regards,

fred burlingame





On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:

> BA is translated as 'come', but it essentially means 'is here', 'is
> present', 'materialized', 'appeared', 'is substantial', and by implication
> 'thickened', 'acquired bulk'. I walk with my 5 years old granddaughter the
> streets of RAMAT-AVIV, by her home, and she will say to me SABA, BA LIY
> GLIYDAH, 'SABA, I desire Ice cream', which is a remarkably pertinent usage
> of the verb BA. The greatest semitist of the land (or for that matter the
> university of Oslo) could not have surpassed this in cleverness and deep
> understanding of the Hebrew language.
> To return to the single-letter roots, I think that it should be obvious
> that GL, 'mound' =GAAH+ ALAH. In Hebrew:
>
> גל = גאה+עלה  גבע=גאה+עבה
>
> Isaac Fried, Boston University
> .
>
>  On Jan 30, 2011, at 11:25 PM, fred burlingame wrote:
>
>  Hello Isaac;
>
> Thanks for your explanation.
>
> If the base meaning of letter ב = thick, how does that conclusion fit with
> the word בוא ? I thought that your meaning of the root letter "bet" in the
> verb "bo" meant "to be?"
>
> regards,
>
> fred burlingame
>
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 8:29 PM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:
>
>> The letters aleph and ayin are meaningless, they are mere filler letters.
>> The words AB אב 'father', and AB עב 'cloud', are sounded today exactly the
>> same way (but have different plurals). We know by context if it is cloud
>> (namely, the thick klutzy clod of water hanging in the heavens), or it is
>> father (namely, the thick klutzy clod of flesh and bones sitting at the 
>> head
>> of the table, and rumored to have sired the children around him). So is
>> final he. Thus, P (of the meaning 'up') is the root of both APAH אפה
>> 'baked', and PAAH פאה 'extend'. AP עף is 'up', and so is AP אף 'nose'.
>>
>> Isaac Fried, Boston University
>>
>>
>>
>
>