Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Randall:

Boy, you make long responses.

On Sat, Mar 12, 2011 at 8:53 AM, Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com> wrote:

> Karl egrapse
> > One of the things that I noticed about pre-Babylonian Exile writings
> > are the extensive oblique statements where the reader has to think
> > about what is said and to fill in data to make sense of the statements.
> > Often that is accompanied by a large vocabulary ... Isaiah ...
> ...
> > Post-Babylonian Exile authors apparently generally lacked the vocabulary
> > and facility with the language to make these literary flourishes,
> evidence
> > that Hebrew was for them a second language, not their primary language.
>
> Thank you, Karl, for a criterion, it is something that can be discussed.
> It is of course, quite subjective, but at least it's a start.
>
> A first comment must be made about your comparison of poetry (Isaiah)
> with the narrative of most of the 'core' 2T (LBH, post-exilic) works.
>

Isaiah is a mixture of poetry and prose with a fuzzy line between the two.
How much of his ‘poetry’ is really prose, and visa versa? Same with
Jeremiah.

Compare those to the post-Babylonian Exile prophets, Haggai, Zacharia and
Malaachi—the images for the most part are explicit rather than poetically
referred to.

>
> Do we use the flourish criterion to place Deuteronomy in 2T because
> so much of the language is plain and clear (I'm not speaking
> about the poetry towards the end of the book.)? Genesis, too,
> is it late because most of it is plain and clear?
>

Don’t be ridiculous!

>
> It is interesting that Fitzmyer…


Who is Fitzmyer? Why would his opinions on Tobit even fit here?


> But back to Ben Sira. it is poetic, which explains some flourishings.
> (Qohelet, is a wisdom essay, and though it is not poetic,
> it is not plain narrative, either, which can explain flourishings.)
>

Before the last few days, I never ever looked at Ben Sira. Then I found
http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/ohpe/ohpe05.htm , that doesn’t look like
Hebrew at all.
http://www.archive.org/stream/hebrewtextofbens00mcrauoft#page/17/mode/2uphas
more text—yes it’s poetry, but a plodding poetry.

You may claim that Qohelet is not poetry, if so, it is a very poetic prose
infected with snatches of poetry throughout.

>
> (examples deleted for space, look at original)
>

These statistics mean little in light of how few writings from Biblical
times remain. How much greater linguistic diversity would have been known if
the temple with its records had not burned in 70 AD? How many “late
features” are really early, just not recorded elsewhere in Tanakh?

Here we are arguing from silence, where we cannot even assign probabilities
because of lack of records.


> from the other thread "Style and Qohelet" I add the
> following in order to avoid two threads:
>
> > Here are a some linguistic examples:
> >
> > אספות asuppot Q 12.11 occurs only here and in
> mishnaic Hebrew.
>

I don’t see how that meaning fits the context, especially when a meaning
“that which is gathered up” fits the context.


> כבר kevar only in Qohelet and mishnaic Hebrew.
>

See above.


> לוה "accompany" Q 8.15 and in mishnaic Hebrew.
>

and in 11 other verses in other books. Not counting the times of joining
oneself to another through obligation of repayment.


> ענין 'affair' 8xx Q and in mishnaic Hebrew
>

This has a suffix that changes a verb to a noun, also used by דמין DMYN,
פדין PDYN, קנין QNYN, and its uses fit the meaning of humiliating, being
humbled from the verb ענה (NH.


> רעיון 'thought' Q 2.22 and in mishnaic Hebrew
>

This is a common ending to change a verb or adjective to a noun, e.g. רפיון
RPYWN, שגיון $GYWN, שריון $RYWN, אביון ABYWN, etc. Also found in 1:17 and
4:16, and all three times meaning “displeasure” from the root רעע R((.

> >
> > ש she- "that" is interesting because of its frequency in Qohelet and
> in mishnaic Hebrew. It has been argued to have come from a northern
> dialect because of its occurrences in Judges and perhaps Jonah. Of
> course, a northern origin would not help a Solomonic authorship
> claim. Since "she-" 'that' cannot be easily explained as Judean in the
> pre-exilic period, it adds considerable weight to the post-exilic
> perspective. >
>

This argument makes no sense at all. Even were it northern dialect, Solomon
ruled over the northern tribes and would have known the term from his
contacts with those northern tribes. To say he would not have known it makes
no sense.

> >
> > Another remarkable feature of the book is the use of w+suffix verb in
> contexts that are parallel with other suffix verbs. All twenty-one
> occurrences are accented as mil`el in the MT. This is remarkable
> because the rabbinic tradition was that Solomon wrote the book, but
> the "mishnaic Hebrew" accentuation of this book is without any
> parallel in the Hebrew Bible for its absolute consistency. In the rest
> of the Heb Bible, non-pausal forms 1s and 2s suffix conjugation tend
> to have a final syllable accent as part of the sequential verb system. >
>

This sounds like an argument that is important only to those who follow the
Masoretic points.

> >
> > The features above are not 'silence' and they do, in fact, support the
> otherwise strong probability that pitgam and pardes were borrowed into
> Hebrew when there was strong Aramaic pressure from on top--during the
> Persian period. >
>

You need to do better.

>
> This list, of course, is just a start, as can be seen by comparing this
> email to the earlier one "Style and Qohelet".
>
> braxot
> Randall Buth
>
>
> These messages take a while to answer, because I need to look up in
concordance, dictionary and Tanakh to make sure I answer accurately. When I
don’t (and I don’t too often), I get in trouble.

Karl W. Randolph.