“International” forms of Biblical Hebrew personal names

2008 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-268
Author(s):  
Tsvi Sadan
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Morphological Adaptation ◽  
Personal Names

The present study attempts to examine what presumably guided Zamenhof in choosing “international” forms for Biblical Hebrew personal names when he translated the whole Hebrew Bible into Esperanto. A comparison of these names graphically and phonetically with their equivalents in eight possible source languages, i.e., Hebrew, Latin, Italian, French, English, German, Polish and Russian, reveals a preference for Hebrew, German and Polish forms in descending order as possible etymons ascribable to Zamenhof’s own linguistic background. The morphological adaptation of these names is conditioned by the phonetic characteristics of their etymons.

WHAT IS YOUR GOD? A CLASSIC PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE ON אלי -X THEOPHORY IN THE HEBREW BIBLE

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Jaco Gericke
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Proper Names ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Prima Facie ◽  
Philosophical Perspective ◽  
Personal Names

What, according to the Hebrew Bible, was a god assumed to be? In this article the author looks at data potentially relevant to any attempt at answering this question within a sub-type of אל theophory in the Hebrew Bible. These involve personal names that can be rendered into English as “My god is x”, where x denotes a phenomenon the deity is prima facie wholly identified with. The approach adopted by the study is philosophical in general and descriptively metaphysical in particular. The objective is to provide an experimental clarification of this particular sub-type of proper names in Biblical Hebrew with the aid of technical conceptual distinctions found within mainstream interpretations of Aristotle’s theory of predication.

New Directions in the Computational Analysis of Biblical Hebrew Grammar

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Cynthia Miller-Naudé ◽  
Jacobus A Naudé
Keyword(s):  
Southern Hemisphere ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
North American ◽  
Computational Analysis ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Linguistic Variation ◽  
European Database ◽  
New Directions ◽  
African Context

The concern of the paper is to highlight how computational analysis of Biblical Hebrew grammar can now be done in very sophisticated ways and with insightful results for exegesis. Three databases, namely, the Eep Talstra Centre for Bible and Computer (ETCBC) Database, the Accordance Hebrew Syntactic Database, and the Andersen-Forbes Syntactic Database,are compared in terms of their relation to linguistic theory (or, theories), the nature and spectrum of retrieved data, and the representation of synchronic and diachronic linguistic variation. Interaction between different contexts, including the African context, are promoted namely between linguists working on Biblical Hebrew and exegetes working on the Hebrew Bible by illustrating how exegesis and language are intimately connected, as well as among geographical contexts by comparing a European database (ETCBC), a North American database (Accordance) and a Southern hemisphere database (Andersen-Forbes).

Sickness and Healing

2020 ◽  
pp. 310-325
Author(s):  
Deborah Rooke
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Hebrew Text ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Ritual Action ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
At Home

Following some methodological remarks the chapter briefly reviews the vocabulary of sickness used in the biblical Hebrew text. It then examines instances of sickness and healing that are described in the Hebrew Bible, in order to establish how sickness is understood and how ritual might therefore relate to it. Aspects considered include the relationship between sickness and sin; whether and how YHWH is involved in causing sickness; epidemics versus individual cases of sickness; and instances of ritual action, broadly understood, that are used to address sickness-related issues. Such instances of ritual action include consulting a functionary such as a priest or prophet, and performing ritual laments and prayers either at home or at a shrine. Two instances of concerns relating to childbearing are also considered, both of which are pictured in the context of ritual action at a shrine.

Archaic Features of Canaanite Personal Names in the Hebrew Bible

1994 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 128
Author(s):  
J. A. Emerton ◽  
S. C. Layton
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Personal Names

Archaic Features of Canaanite Personal Names in the Hebrew Bible

1992 ◽  
Vol 111 (2) ◽  
pp. 315
Author(s):  
Frank L. Benz ◽  
Scott C. Layton
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Personal Names

Biblical Quotations in the Aramaic Incantation Bowls and Their Contribution to the Study of the Babylonian Reading Tradition

2020 ◽  
pp. 147-170
Author(s):  
Dorota Molin
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Biblical Hebrew

Dorota Molin’s article highlights the importance of the incantation bowls in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic from the sixth–seventh centuries CE for the study of the pre-Masoretic Babylonian reading tradition of Biblical Hebrew. Biblical quotations within these bowls constitute the only direct documentation of Biblical Hebrew from Babylonia at that time. The phonetic spelling of the quotations provides much information about their pronunciation. In a series of case studies Molin shows that the pronunciation of the quotations corresponds closely to the medieval Babylonian reading tradition. She also demonstrates that they reflect interference from the Aramaic vernacular, manifested especially in weakening of the guttural consonants, and that the writers drew from an oral tradition of the Hebrew Bible.

“My Thoughts Are (Not) Your Thoughts.” Transposed Second-Order Thinking in the Hebrew Bible

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaco Gericke
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Religious Language ◽  
Western Philosophy ◽  
Twilight Zone ◽  
Greek Philosophy ◽  
Semitic Languages ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Ways Of Thinking

Following 19th-century distinctions between Hellenism and Hebraism, many popular 20th-century histories of Western philosophy assigned the intellectual world of the Hebrew Bible to a twilight zone between late mythological and early philosophical ways of thinking. Partly in response to this, research in Semitic languages during that time began to include comparative-linguistic arguments hoping to demonstrate radical structural incommensurability between Hebrew and Greek ways of thinking. In the latest trend in the associated research, a multi-disciplinary dialogue has been initiated on the subject of “second-order thinking” within the ancient Near East “before” or “outside” Greek philosophy. In this article, the author aims to contribute to the ongoing discussion by suggesting that Biblical Hebrew as religious language already presupposes an intricate variety of transposed second-order thinking.

THE USE OF THE DEFINITE ARTICLE IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOME BIBLICAL TOPONYMS

2002 ◽  
Vol 52 (3) ◽  
pp. 334-349
Author(s):  
S. Noah Lee
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Linguistic Community ◽  
Definite Article ◽  
Semantic Change ◽  
Linguistic Change ◽  
Long Period

AbstractBiblical Hebrew like other languages exhibits diachronic linguistic changes. One such linguistic change observable in the Hebrew Bible is the use of the definite article in the development of some biblical toponyms. What is behind the different forms of the same place-name, such as 'the Mount Gilboa' ( ) in 1 Sam. xxxi 1 vs. 'Mount Gilboa' ( ) in 1 Ch. x 1? It is observed that the use or absence of the article is by no means an accident but the result of a semantic change over a long period of use by the linguistic community. Furthermore, the use of the article in the development of toponyms shows the relative dates of writing of biblical books. The outcome of the study indicates the archaic character of the books of the Pentateuch and Joshua, and relative late dates of writing of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah.

Discord between the Tiberian Written and Reading Traditions

2020 ◽  
pp. 227-280
Author(s):  
Aaron D. Hornkohl
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Dead Sea Scrolls ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Dead Sea ◽  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Linguistic Development ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Real Language ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Biblical Sources

Aaron Hornkohl examines two features in the Tiberian reading tradition of Biblical Hebrew, namely the qal construct infinitive and the 3ms possessive suffix that is attached to plural nouns and some prepositions. The article argues that although the vocalisation in both cases is secondary relative to what is represented by the consonantal text, it is not artificial and post-biblical, but rather a relatively ancient product of the real language situation of an earlier period, namely, the Second Temple Period, if not earlier. The view that the vocalisation has such historical depth and is the result of natural linguistic development is often dismissed by biblical scholars. By examining the distribution of forms within the Tiberian Masoretic version of the Hebrew Bible and in extra-biblical sources, especially the Dead Sea Scrolls and First Temple period epigraphy, Hornkohl convincingly demonstrates that the incongruity between the vocalisation and the consonantal text is earlier than Rabbinic Hebrew (second–third centuries CE).

Abishai, Daniel and Hezekiah

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-98
Author(s):  
Aviv Schoenfeld
Keyword(s):  
Biblical Hebrew ◽  
Personal Names

Abstract This paper analyzes Biblical Hebrew personal names like ʔăḇīšay ‘Abishai’ and dɔ̄niyyēl ‘Daniel’, names that are made of two primary elements that are related to meaningful elements from outside the domain of personal names. I argue that these names are best analyzed as a case of lexical secreted affixation, such that their recurring element is a derivational affix for deriving personal names. Furthermore, I argue that the medial vowel, occurring in the middle of ʔăḇīšay and dɔ̄niyyēl, is an underlying part of the affixes, such that they are /ʔabi-/ and /-iʔel/. An Optimality-theoretic account is given for the allomorphy of the Yahwistic suffix and variable occurrence of the medial vowel. Lastly, I argue that these affixes diachronically originate from blend and clitic group names that were morphologically reanalyzed to include an affix.

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