Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>]

What I mean by self evident is that all we need for verification is  
to open the Hebrew Bible and look for it.

In Gen. 3:7 PAQAX is used to the parting of the eyelids to expose the  
pupil (indeed, in the extended sense of understanding what one sees),  
while in 1Ki 8:29 the verb PATAX is used for it. In Dt. 15:8 PATAX is  
used for the parting of the fingers of the hand.

Opening the eyes is such a common act that Hebrew has a special verb  
for it. Hebrew has also this special verb NAGAN, 'to play a musical  
instrumet', absent in English!

All we have in Biblical Hebrew is what we see written, and hence a  
phonetic analysis of its verbs is irrelevant, methinks.

I believe that the only way to penetrate the internal logic of the  
Hebrew language is via the realization that some of its letters are  
mere variants, say ג ח כ ק G X K Q. There is no doubt in my mind,  
for instance, that PISEX RAGLAYIM  is PISEQ RAGLAYIM, 'a spreader, or  
parter, of (limp) legs'. Here [Y] is a PISEX RAGLAYIM standing on his  
head.

What is this RO$ HA-PISG-AH of Nu. 23:14? Of course, it is ראש  
הפשקה RO$ HA-PISQ-AH, the point where the mountain parts its  
slopes. The place is also called שדה צופים SDE COPIYM (COPEH  
is, I believe, a COBEH, 'erect'), a vantage point, an observatory.  
This is how ancient Hebrews understood PISGAH, and this is how I  
understand it.

Today we use the word פסיג PSIYG for the embryonic parting of the  
leaves in a sprouting seed. Here is how it looks like [Y].

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Apr 23, 2012, at 7:36 PM, Will Parsons wrote:

> Hi Isaac,
>
> On Mon, 23 Apr 2012 00:03:54 -0400, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>  
> wrote:
> > 1. It is not clear to me how to advance "real evidence" for something
> > that is manifestly self evident.
>
> What is self-evident to you is not so much to me.  A lot of phonetic
> similarities can be attributed to simple coincidence, especially when
> what are being compared are sequences of three consonants only.
> Nevertheless, I'm not completely excluding the possibility of a
> relationship, just that it needs to be based on more that individual
> phonetic similarities.  What I would regard as "real evidence" is a
> pattern of correspondences, whereby it could be demonstrated that taw
> corresponds to qoph in a series of semantically-related roots (not
> just פתח and פקח), and that heth corresponds to... (what?  
> nothing? a
> vowel?  a [j]?) in a series of roots besides פתה/פתי and  
> פקח.  Perhaps
> it is possible to demonstrate such correspondences on a systematic
> level, but I at least haven't seen such claims.
>
> --
> Will Parsons
> μη φαινεσθαι, αλλ' ειναι.