Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Ishinan:

On Wed, May 1, 2013 at 8:06 PM, Ishinan <ishinan AT comcast.net> wrote:

 

When we talk about 'Goshen', there seems to be a horde of  linguistic problems which have seldom been confronted. 

 

Such as, the conspicuous absence of many essential and unique Hebrew terms referring exclusively to Egypt's landmarks (i.e. obviously giant structures that could not have been missed) the Pyramids, the Sphinx, obelisks etc..

There are a few reasons these were not mentioned, among which:

• They were not found in the lang of Goshen, where the Hebrews concentrated.

• All but one of the surviving obelisks long post-date the Hebrew sojourn in Egypt.

• The existence of these was irrelevant to a quick history of Hebrew enslavement.

 

Most of all, a proper name for the River Nile. Actually the name of this Mighty River is not found in the Scriptures, but frequently referred to as simply, "the river".

As far as I can tell, Y)R and its variant Y)WR was never used as a name except for the Nile. 

Absence of specific names for typically Egyptian animals like hippopotami and crocodiles.

Again, not germane to the history.

 

Rather, these are translated into fantastic and vague terms such as: Leviathan, dragon or behemoth. All of which can be used to mean any fictitious monster.

These are terms for animals that were known outside of Egypt, animals which apparently have become extinct since then.

 

  

And then, there is of course the topic of  'cats' or the lack thereof.  This is rather puzzling, especially in the presence of the name 'Bubastis' which served as the capital of the Nome of Am-Khent. FYI, 'Bubastis' was a center of worship for the feline goddess Bas.

Again, how relevant was that to the history that was recorded? 

 

Finally, when it comes to mentioning 'Camels' we have a bigger problem, in that Ancient Egyptians did not know about camels until they were introduced by Persian conquerors in 525 BCE.  This, despite Exodus 9:3 which seems to suggest otherwise, "since the Lord spoke of camels as among the prized herds of the Egyptians, along with cattle, horses, donkeys and sheep."

Seeing as camels had been domesticated and used for trading 1500 years before the Persian invasion, the claim that Egyptians were ignorant of such sounds rather … uh … strange. 

 

Any thoughts about the absence of these essential terms which would normally be descriptive of a long sojourn lasting for over four centuries?

Yeah, see above.

The picture I get from Exodus is that the Egyptians worked through crew bosses to get workers from among the Israelites, so only the crew bosses needed to learn Egyptian. That would explain sparse Egyptian influences into Hebrew.

 

Ishinan Ishibashi

 

Karl W. Randolph.