Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Chavoux Luyt <chavoux AT gmail.com>]

Shalom George

I just find it interesting that except for Nehemia, the only two
places in the Tanach where the word "pardes" occurs, is in two poetic
books ascribed to Solomon. Normally, the use of the same unusual words
would at least be considered as evidence (not proof) for them having
the same author.

> On Tue, Mar 8, 2011 at 12:26 PM, George Athas 
> <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>wrote:
>
> With פרדס, it's in all likelihood a word that entered the Hebrew vocabulary 
> in the Persian Era (or at a stretch just slightly earlier). It usually 
> appears in
> poetic contexts. It's unlikely that a scribe would update a poetic text 
> with new vocabulary, since poetry generally uses fancy vocabulary anyway. 
> It's more
> likely that a scribe would update a narrative or legal text with a new word.
While I agree with you that it is unlikely to be a late scribal
addition to the text, I am not sure that there is any real evidence
for it being a loan word from Persian rather than from Median. And the
Medes were a power long before the Persian Empire. If Solomon had
trading relations with Sheba (Southern Arabia?) and Ophir and his
kingdom reached to the Euphrates in the North, while having trading
relations with both Hittites, Egyptians and Aram, it is not so
unlikely that he might have had contact with the Medes, if only
indirectly. I think it is premature to conclude that Pardes came from
Persian rather than Median and that it is the result of the influence
of the old Persian empire rather than reaching Israel via normal trade
relations (possibly via a third language like Akkadian or Aramaic). If
it was found in more of the post-exilic books, I would feel more
comfortable with such a conclusion.

Regards
Chavoux Luyt