Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Dewayne Dulaney <dewayne.dulaney AT gmail.com>]

 > While the people would leave the written Hebrew text unchanged, because it
> had no vowels, they would give it the Aramaic vowels as they read it.

That might be the case if people stopped using Hebrew entirely, but
clearly they didn't. You are aware that several books of the OT canon
were written after the exile (Ezra, Nehemiah, possibly 1-2 Chronicles,
Zechariah, Haggai, Malachi), in Hebrew, aren't you? (I accept the
conservative dating of Daniel, which is partly in Hebrew and partly in
Aramaic, and thus don't include it as post-exilic.) Not to mention
evidence of Hebrew usage at Qumran, Hebrew inscriptions (even at the
Temple itself, such as famed "place of the trumpeting" inscription),
ostraca, usage on coins by the Macabbees, etc. And while I grant you
don't accept the Massoretes' vowel pointing as accurate, do you think
they just made them up out of thin air? There had to be some knowledge
of Hebrew pronunciation passed down, even if imperfect, for them to
work with.

As for Hebrew and Aramaic being totally mutually incomprehensible, I
doubt that. They were in the same language family. So, for that
matter, are Arabic and Hebrew. I only know a few Arabic words and
phrases (oral form only; I haven't learned the script yet). Yet
several of them were immediately obvious to me due to knowing Biblical
Hebrew (I only know a smattering of modern Hebrew, so couldn't draw on
that), The common Arabic greeting "Salaam alekoum", for instance, is
clearly equivalent to Heb. שלום עליכם.

I only know a little Aramaic. Yet when I saw the Mel Gibson film "The
Passion of the Christ", I understood the majority of the Aramaic
dialogue without relying on the subtitles because of its similarity to
Biblical Hebrew.

Another example: I have never studied Italian. I only know a handful
of Italian words and phrases. Yet because I have studied Spanish,
French, and Portuguese, all related to Italian, and have studied
Latin, the ancestor of Italian, I can recognize and understand at
least 60-70% of spoken and written Italian I've been exposed to (in
movies and articles online).

Randall is correct to use comparative linguistics the way he does.
That you may not acknowledge it does not change the accuracy of it.

Dewayne Dulaney

דואין דוליני


On 10/6/11, Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 6, 2011 at 9:36 PM, K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Let’s look at your evidence:
>>
>
> Please do. You've ignored it.
>
>
>> Arabic, different language and late, irrelevant.
>> Aramaic, different language and what evidence for vowels is there that is
>> not late?
>> MT points, late after a time when it is admitted that unstressed vowels
>> were dropped.
>>
>
> Sorry, but your dismissal is simply ignorance of historical linguistics. It
> is all verifyible data for those with the background to evaluate it. So
> you wish to present speculation as evidence and simply ignore historical
> linguistics and massive amounts of data that verify patterns. That is your
> choice. In academics this is called 'untenable'. I thought that maybe you
> were ready to evaluate evidence and learn something.
>
> This ends the thread in my perspective.
>
>
>> ...
>>
>
>
>> While the people would leave the written Hebrew text unchanged, because it
>> had no vowels, they would give it the Aramaic vowels as they read it.
>>
>
> This is a demonstrably false statement. What was it about Aram katbet/kitbet
> versus Heb katabti that you didn't understand? (Evidence is better than
> speculation. You prefer Syriac ketbet?)
>
> Again, with your insistence on presenting speculation and ignoring all
> historical linguistic evidence, there remains nothing of substance to
> discuss with you.
>
> "barakawata"
>
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 6, 2011 at 12:45 AM, Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>  Perhaps the time has come to clear up a question that seems to recur on
>>> b-hebrew concerning the shape of Hebrew words.
>>>
>>> The following was raised on a different thread and needs its own thread
>>> to
>>> be discussed
>>>
>>> >As far as pronunciation, when we look at poetry, if we read it as each
>>> letter representing a syllable consisting of a consonant followed by a
>>> vowel, the text then has a meter, a rhythm, that it lacks when read with
>>> modern pronunciation. However, the modern pronunciation or a
>>> reconstruction
>>> of Tiberian pronunciation based largely on Yemenite pronunciation, are
>>> very
>>> similar and the most widely known, therefore any teaching should teach
>>> that.
>>> >
>>>
>>> That proposal by Karl is that Hebrew was a CV(CV)(CV)-only language.
>>> (C=consonant, V=vowel)
>>> The contention of all Hebraists that I know is that Hebrew has both CV
>>> and
>>> CVC syllables.
>>> I find the CV-only proposal to be untenable, so maybe it would be good to
>>> see its 'evidence'.
>>>
>>> The poetic argument above seems impossible to demonstrate consistently
>>> and it becomes highly subjective.
>>> E.g. Ex 15:4 (filling in 'v' for any vowel)
>>> תהמת יכסימו  tvhvmvtv yvkvsvyvmvwv (10)
>>> ירדו במצולת כמו-אבן  yvrvdvwv bvmvSvwvlvtv kvmvwv 'vbvnv (16)
>>> (in traditional terms this is a 2 beats plus 3 beats.)
>>>
>>> On the other hand, there is excellent morphological evidence for CVC
>>> syllables in BH.
>>> Any syllable pattern must explain its relationship to sister languages
>>> and
>>> must reasoably explain the trajectory and changes within the languages.
>>> E.g., BH katabti 'I wrote' has a CVC syllable in -tab- according to the
>>> MT.
>>> Also katabta 'you wrote' with CVC.
>>>
>>> One must ask whether or not that reflects the biblical language. Did BH
>>> have
>>> CVC syllables?
>>>
>>> One may look at sister languages and see what developments took place and
>>> propose explanations that can can cover the overall developments and
>>> relationships, just like what is done in IndoEuropean languages.
>>>
>>> Arabic has katabtu 'I wrote' katabta 'you wrote' with a CVC syllable in
>>> exactly the same place. Also the same 'a' vowels. Hb and Ab diverge in
>>> the
>>> final vowel 1p and i/u splits are quite common between languages and
>>> dialects. Both i/u are  'high' vowels. In fact, many Arabic dialects
>>> today
>>> have words that differ in i/u across dialects yaktub/yiktib/yaktib 'he
>>> will
>>> write'. uzen/izen 'ear'
>>>
>>> Aramaic is genetically closer to Hebrew than Arabic. (this is seen in the
>>> binyan structures where Arm-Hb are tighter than Arabic is with either,
>>> and
>>> in overall shared vocabulary that is 'genetic' [ereS 'earth' Aram ara`]
>>> and
>>> not 'borrowed') What does Arm have?
>>> katbet 'I wrote', ketabta/ketabt(e) 'you wrote'. It has -tab- like the
>>> others in 2s but has a closed syllable -bet in the 1s.
>>> A historical linguist finds this helpful from several directions. First,
>>> the
>>> connection between Arabic and Hebrew, even though more distantly related
>>> than Hb-Arm, preserves a -tab- syllable in the 1s, which points to
>>> Aramaic
>>> as an innovator for this feature. (It apparently dropped its 1s vowel and
>>> then resolved the consonants with a new vowel.) Secondly, it shows that
>>> the
>>> Hebrew pattern did not develop from Aramaic. This is important because
>>> Karl
>>> has frequently claimed that during the exile or shortly after the Jewish
>>> people suddenly forgot BH and used Aramaic to fill in what was missing.
>>> That
>>> is not an explanation that any historical linguist will be able to accept
>>> as
>>> explaining the above evidence. It's just not in the cards. Thirdly, the
>>> MT
>>> preserves the archaic -tab- syllable in the 1s, which is one piece of
>>> evidence showing the conservative nature of the MT morphology.
>>>
>>> Nouns show similar congruence across these languages.
>>> The noun pattern *maktab/*miktab is preserved in all three languages,
>>> suggesting that it is genetically shared from a period before they split
>>> from each other. Note the CVC-CVC pattern
>>> The segolates also show preservation from before their divergence. E.g.
>>> Heb
>>> malki is like Arabic malki is like Aramaic malki, despite the fact that
>>> the
>>> lemma form is melek in Hebrew. This is explained by the old case system
>>> where *malk-un dropped the case -un and then the resulting CvCC resolved
>>> itself by becoming CvCvC malik>melek. Similar changes are seen today in
>>> colloquial Arabic where the dropping of the case system results in CvCC
>>> becoming CvCvC.
>>> This all makes perfect historical linguistic sense. Plus the vowels in
>>> the
>>> CvCC-un words can be traced accross the languages and certain
>>> correspondences are seen that prove a genetic, developmental relationship
>>> to
>>> a historical linguist. E.g. Arabic *u> Hb *o, Ar *a > Hb *e (but remains
>>> *a
>>> where a suffix does not create a need for final CC resolution). Ar *i >
>>> Hb
>>> *e (but *i where a suffix does not creat a need for final CC resolution.)
>>>
>>> These can be multiplied with hundreds of specific examples.  (e.g. Ar
>>> kalb-un, 'dog' kalbi 'my dog', Heb keleb kalbi.)
>>>
>>> In choosing between such an analysis that has CVC already in the period
>>> of
>>> BH and an analysis that has only CV, there would seem to be only one
>>> rational choice for a historical linguist. CVC. I claim that it is the
>>> only
>>> tenable view. So it would be nice if this thread can bring the issue to a
>>> close for b-Hebrew.
>>>
>>> braxot
>>>
>>> Randall Buth
>>>
>>> --
>>> Randall Buth, PhD
>>> www.biblicallanguagecenter.com
>>> Biblical Language Center
>>> Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Randall Buth, PhD
> www.biblicallanguagecenter.com
> Biblical Language Center
> Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life
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-- 
"In the world you will have trouble. But, be brave! I have defeated the 
world!"
—John 16:33, DDV (Dewayne Dulaney Version)

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