חרש from Qal to Hiphil?

[Chris Watts]

Chris: Look at Jeremiah 41:17 and it says “everybody”. Again 42:17 all die. 43:5–6 all those left in the land went to Egypt, none left in Judea.

Jeremiah sent his writings to Babylon from Egypt. Jeremiah 51:60.

As I wrote before, who am I to contradict Jeremiah?

Karl W. Randolph.

You are blatantly ignoring the scriptures I just quoted to you, it's called balance. And the most obvious thing in the world is that when God has said 'all' we all know what he means, All Germany followed Hitler, and God destroyed Germany!!!!! Is this a true statement??? Well by your standard of deduction, No! Because there were many who did not follow him and many towns left completely untouched. But by common sense and logical reasoning - we all understand what "ALL' actually means within this context.

In God's economy 'ALL' has always meant the seriousness of the situation while at the same time leaving a few, a remnant, no matter how small. The scripture clearly states that a remnant shall return out of Egypt and scripture intimates very clearly that Jeremiah also did, and his parchments must have come by the hand of someone who escaped Egypt

God said many times that He would destroy and utterly annihilate the Northern Kingdom of Israel and that all ten tribes would disappear and never return and he would no longer have mercy upon them. Is this a true statement? There are many scriptures where we read about Jews belonging to the different tribes of the Northern Kingdom living long after this happened, even up to 100 AD we read about them! There are also many scriptures where God clearly says that the the Northern Kingdom would be restored and Israel would return along with Judah! There is no contradiction here, scripture NEVER cancels each opposing statement out, we do not choose which one is more correct - both are correct and both have happened and both are equally true.


So the fact remains, God brought his Judgment upon those who willingly chose to go down to Egypt and ended up in serious rebellion, but God had compassion on those hearts whom He foreknew, and declared that a few would return to Judah. This is what scripture says.

chris watts

[kwrandolph]

Chris: Look at Jeremiah 41:17 and it says “everybody”. Again 42:17 all die. 43:5–6 all those left in the land went to Egypt, none left in Judea.

Jeremiah sent his writings to Babylon from Egypt. Jeremiah 51:60.

As I wrote before, who am I to contradict Jeremiah?

Karl W. Randolph.

You are blatantly ignoring the scriptures I just quoted to you,

Looking at the second passage, it says nothing about Baruch returning to Judea. Connecting that with Jeremiah 51:60, Jeremiah sent somebody from Egypt to Babylon to carry his prophecies to Babylon. That was before Nebuchadnezzar came to Egypt and killed all the men of Judea. That person went not to Jerusalem, which at that time was a heap of ruins where nobody resided. Was that somebody Baruch? Scripture is silent.

The first passage you mentioned, Jeremiah 44:26–28, includes verse 27 where all the men will die. Those who escape the sword mentioned in verse 28, if all the men are dead, most likely would be women and children, and only a tiny number of them returned to Judea.

it's called balance. And the most obvious thing in the world is that when God has said 'all' we all know what he means, All Germany followed Hitler, and God destroyed Germany!!!!! Is this a true statement??? Well by your standard of deduction, No! Because there were many who did not follow him and many towns left completely untouched. But by common sense and logical reasoning - we all understand what "ALL' actually means within this context.

In this example, I don’t say “all”. Never did.

In God's economy 'ALL' has always meant the seriousness of the situation while at the same time leaving a few, a remnant, no matter how small. The scripture clearly states that a remnant shall return out of Egypt and scripture intimates very clearly that Jeremiah also did, and his parchments must have come by the hand of someone who escaped Egypt

There is no intimation in Scripture that Jeremiah escaped out of Egypt. There is no evidence that Baruch returned to Judea. There is evidence that Jeremiah’s writings were sent directly from Egypt to Babylon.

God said many times that He would destroy and utterly annihilate the Northern Kingdom of Israel and that all ten tribes would disappear and never return and he would no longer have mercy upon them. Is this a true statement? There are many scriptures where we read about Jews belonging to the different tribes of the Northern Kingdom living long after this happened, even up to 100 AD we read about them!

There were people from the Northern Tribes living in Judea before the Northern Kingdom was destroyed. When the Northern Kingdom was destroyed, and it was completely destroyed, but the people from those tribes were not all killed off, rather they were sent into exile.

There are also many scriptures where God clearly says that the the Northern Kingdom would be restored

Not as a separate kingdom.

and Israel would return along with Judah!

Not at the same time.

There is no contradiction here, scripture NEVER cancels each opposing statement out, we do not choose which one is more correct - both are correct and both have happened and both are equally true.


So the fact remains, God brought his Judgment upon those who willingly chose to go down to Egypt and ended up in serious rebellion, but God had compassion on those hearts whom He foreknew, and declared that a few would return to Judah. This is what scripture says.

chris watts

Your argument originally was that there was a large contingent of Jews who remained in Judea, speaking Biblical Hebrew. But there is no evidence that that happened. Rather that the last of those who were native speakers of Biblical Hebrew died after Cyrus ordered the building of the second temple. Scripture doesn’t say how long afterwards, but it would have been within a few decades. Ezra and Nehemiah give evidence that Hebrew was NOT the language of the street, market nor hearth at their time, so that means that native speaking had already died out.

As for those in Egypt who returned, is there any evidence that any returned before Cyrus gave them permission to return? Further that they were so few that they were insignificant, not even counted.

Karl W. Randolph.

[Chris Watts]

Chris Watts wrote:
There are also many scriptures where God clearly says that the the Northern Kingdom would be restored

KARL SAID : Not as a separate kingdom.

How can you possibly have thought that that was I meant?

Chris Watts wrote: and Israel would return along with Judah!

KARL REPLIED : Not at the same time.

On this particular subject please refer to Ezekiel whole chapter 37 and combine that with Isaiah 11:11-16. (and a host of others that are clearly not pre-messianic)

KARL ALSO SAID : Your argument originally was that there was a large contingent of Jews who remained in Judea, speaking Biblical Hebrew. But there is no evidence that that happened.

I absolutely agree - There is no evidence. This is your strength of argument and it goes well with most people. But an absence of evidence can never be the evidence that supports the opposite supposition. It is simply Common sense coupled with a dollop of well-refined human experience that says and knows that some Israelites did remain in Southern Israel during that exile who would not have sat around a dinner table one sunny evening and decided amongst themselves that they had had enough of Hebrew let's all speak aramaic, and those that did return from Egypt would not have switched to the Egyptian tongue. I do not advocate its continuance in a pure form, nor the fact that it changed, I am just antagonistic to your black and white approach.

KARL COMMENTED : . Ezra and Nehemiah give evidence that Hebrew was NOT the language of the street, market nor hearth at their time, so that means that native speaking had already died out.

Are you referring to Nehemiah 9:8? This is called teaching, guiding, helping them to understand - not translating into Aramaic, otherwise it would have said so more directly now wouldn't it? Also Nehemiah 13:24 is insufficient evidence as it does not mean everybody, but enough Jews no doubt to make Nehemiah extremely grumpy to be around.

As a side issue

KARL MENTIONED : Jeremiah sent his writings to Babylon from Egypt. Jeremiah 51:60

Where is the evidence that this book he refers to was sent from Egypt and not from his hometown or Judea or Jerusalem itself? Just because it at the end of the book? Read verse 59, unless you wish to separate verse 59 from verse 60 by a few years then those two verses literally follow one after the other, and this places Jeremiah in Jerusalem at this time.

I think it might be worth mentioning that the language of Babylonia was not necessarily dominated by Aramaic but rather Syrian and since letters were written to Cyrus by those Samarian trouble-makers in the Syrian and translated in Syrian, this was not quite the same as assuming that Aramaic, as a vernacular, was as widespread as some might like to imagine. Furthermore it would be wise to consider that since Nehemiah makes a very clear and emphatic objection to some children of Israelites speaking HALF in Philistine, Moab and Ammonite, that according to scripture Nebuchadnezzar destroyed these peoples, they still managed to hold onto their native dialect distinguishable from the Hebrew. And the fact that Nehemiah makes reference to "not being able to speak the Jews' language" - undoubtedly a dialect that clearly distinguished Jews from the Babylonian and Syrian dialects.

Karl, the root and foundation of your assumptions are correct - I do not disagree with your principles, what I militate against is the speed at which you assume things happened and of course the absence of simple reasoning on a couple of side-tracked issues. These, coupled with the fact that History can never be compartmentalised into abrupt change but everything is a slow gradual process with exceptions to the rule, and when it comes to the Israelites, it is human nature that some will carry the old ways and the old things into a new era thereby maintaining a very distinct chain to the past - of which the Jewish people have proven themselves very apt at accomplishing, especially when it comes to the instinctive need to maintain continuity, as best as they can, with לָשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ.

chris watts