Masoretes and their lack of knowledge?

[Galena]

Ok Karl this really has to be the end I suppose. You strip away every sentence I write and you are very clever at it. You have portrayed that document as being total rubbish when in fact he has a lot of good points which do seem to rub against your prejudice, I admit some things are open to question and the Greek? He only mentions a couple of words in a few thousand worded essay. I sincerely believe that the so called errors you claim to have found are nothing more than than your opinions of interpretation. You seem to place yourself way above people who had far more knowledge than yourself and far more experience and far more grammatical understanding. They did not make mistakes or errors, they made DECISIONS about the best way to preserve the meaning of the text in the light of different ways of pronounciation. What you may see a mistake could more than likely be a lack of understanding of any number of things literature wise, or even that you may not have something at your disposal today in the 21st century that they had at their disposal then.

My purpose in this discussion has never been to say that you are wrong and I am right, rather to challenge your apparent belief that the masoretes were so unreliable that we always have to be on our guard. If you believe that the word is inspired, as you previously said, then you have to accept that the pointing also was inspired, for how else could we then have a meaningful text? The masoretes undertook a monumental task that is pure genius, not even their doubtful disputations and questionable pointing on isolated issues has detracted one iota from the inspired word, its purpose, its meaning its intention. This is to their genius and their work. I challenge only your apparent inclination towards distrust and insistence that reading with the pointed text leads one into error rather than truth. So to summarise one has to conclude that despite you saying earlier whether I trust God or man I now am forced by necessity of your rhetoric to ask you a question: Did God then fail to convey his message sufficiently that He then leaves it up to you to figure out from the consonants what the messages and translation should reveal?

Kind regards

[kwrandolph]

Dear Chris:

Ok Karl this really has to be the end I suppose.

In other words, don’t confuse me with the facts, I have made up my mind.

You have portrayed that document as being total rubbish when in fact he has a lot of good points which do seem to rub against your prejudice,

It’s not my prejudice. The facts are online for anyone to see. Facts are rather stubborn things against which are not arguments without facts rather foolish?

I admit some things are open to question and the Greek? He only mentions a couple of words in a few thousand worded essay.

But he redefined those words and made them the center of his argument.

I sincerely believe that the so called errors you claim to have found are nothing more than than your opinions of interpretation.

Backed up by context, grammar, word definitions, in other words, evidence.

You seem to place yourself way above people who had far more knowledge than yourself and far more experience and far more grammatical understanding.

Oh? On what basis do you make that charge?

Where do you see in their writings the recognition that the literary Hebrew of their time was a different language than Biblical Hebrew, with different grammar, and many words having been redefined? If you don’t find that, how then can you make the claim that they have more knowledge than I and others who have made the same recognition as I?

The consensus among linguists is that the language of literary, medieval Hebrew is different from Biblical Hebrew, the disagreement among us is how it differs. I and a minority claim that it was modal, the majority of linguists say it was aspectual, while medieval Hebrew was tense based. That was just some of the differences. If the Masoretes didn’t recognize these differences, and there’s no evidence that they did, then there are times that they misunderstood the text because of those differences.

They did not make mistakes or errors, they made DECISIONS about the best way to preserve the meaning of the text in the light of different ways of pronounciation.

“They did not make mistakes or errors”??? In other words, they were without sin? Only those without sin don’t make mistakes or errors.

What you may see a mistake could more than likely be a lack of understanding of any number of things literature wise, or even that you may not have something at your disposal today in the 21st century that they had at their disposal then.

Or is it the other way around, that we have tools at our disposal that they didn’t then? Such as the possibility of doing electronic searches that in seconds can give us a list of words and/or phrases that they couldn’t do then?

My purpose in this discussion has never been to say that you are wrong and I am right, rather to challenge your apparent belief that the masoretes were so unreliable that we always have to be on our guard.

A “challenge” demands an answer, either to acquiesce that the challenge is correct, or to make a vigorous response that the challenge is wrong. In my response, I want facts, and so far you provide beliefs and opinions, some of which are contradicted by the facts. So my response to your challenge is a challenge back to you, to re-examine your prejudices in the light of facts.

It’s not “apparent belief”, rather decisions made upon the basis of linguistic analysis of the facts of the text.

If you believe that the word is inspired, as you previously said, then you have to accept that the pointing also was inspired,

This is an illogical statement. Why should I accept the points, which were not even invented until over 1000 years after the last native speaker of Biblical Hebrew had died, as being inspired in the theological sense? From a Christian viewpoint, they were not even believers in the text.

for how else could we then have a meaningful text?

You need to learn Hebrew, because an unpointed text delivers up a load of meaning. Often more than the pointed text.

The masoretes undertook a monumental task that is pure genius, not even their doubtful disputations and questionable pointing on isolated issues has detracted one iota from the inspired word, its purpose, its meaning its intention. This is to their genius and their work.

And I and others who question their points are not also genius? Isn’t that claim rather presumptuous on your part?

I challenge only your apparent inclination towards distrust and insistence that reading with the pointed text leads one into error rather than truth.

That’s exactly why I question the points. And I am not alone.

So to summarise one has to conclude that despite you saying earlier whether I trust God or man I now am forced by necessity of your rhetoric to ask you a question: Did God then fail to convey his message sufficiently that He then leaves it up to you to figure out from the consonants what the messages and translation should reveal?

This is a theological question, but I’ll answer it. For those who are not Christian, you can ignore the following paragraphs.

God inspired the Biblical writers to write texts without points that people of their time had no problem reading and understanding. Those original texts were without error. However we no longer have those original texts. What we have are copies of copies made by fallible men. Those fallible men have introduced errors. However, most of those errors we can recognize, most are on the level of typos.

I do not translate, I work from the original languages.

Commentaries are written by fallible men, therefore contain mistakes. One extensive set of commentary are the Masoretic points added to God’s Word by people who, from a Christian viewpoint, didn’t believe the text. Therefore, from a Christian viewpoint, there are two reasons to question the accuracy of those points.

Kind regards

So now, do you wish to withdraw your challenge?

Karl W. Randolph.

[Galena]

“
Galena wrote:
They did not make mistakes or errors, they made DECISIONS about the best way to preserve the meaning of the text in the light of different ways of pronounciation.

Karl wrote: They did not make mistakes or errors”??? In other words, they were without sin? Only those without sin don’t make mistakes or errors.

Ok so Moses Jeremiah and all the authors that wrote the original text, were they fallible men, or were they without sin?

Karl wrote: But he redefined those words and made them the center of his argument.

No he did not, he spent most of his analysis about scriptural verses and showed how there must have been some rudimentary pointing in those days, did you get beyond the first 5 or 6 pages or so? I wish I could post that paper here for others to critique.

Karl wrote : Or is it the other way around, that we have tools at our disposal that they didn’t then?

Ahh, tools made by fallible men my dear Karl! and not without sin eh!

Karl wrote : This is an illogical statement. Why should I accept the points, which were not even invented until over 1000 years after the last native speaker of Biblical Hebrew had died

My research had shown quite clearly that the masoretes did not invent the complete system, that they had some rudimenentary vowel pointing and notes from the soferim and the temple period, some things collated into the talmud also which was sometimes a commentary on the grammar, they had an array of "rudimentary grammatical notes" to assist them in DEVELOPING a system of standardisation based on known biblical pronounciation, a mixture of the vernacular and the medieval ways of re-citing verses. This is what I have learned and this is what you say is wrong, fine. This is what that paper, that I sent you, tries to explain also. Ironically it was what I had read from scholars of the DSS, the little that I did read, where they also inferred the likelihood of standardisation in pronounciation from as far back as Ezra in many words analysed, now the DSS may not have dots, and I am not a scholar of linguistics, but it is these people's careers and jobs to investigate this sort of thing.

Karl wrote:You need to learn Hebrew, because an unpointed text delivers up a load of meaning. Often more than the pointed text.

This is often called ambiguity - a great literary device - please don't mistake double or triple meanings as mistakes I can prove to you a text where scholars are divided and yet they have their grammatical spectacles on - are you interested? Let me know. However, I am certain that the masoretes were well aware of those areas presenting complications in places where misunderstanding could occur and ambiguity was not intended - hence the need for standardisation, to preserve the faith so to speak,yes, so they copied what was copied what had been copied what was previously copied, so what? How do you know that they did not preserve every letter in its utter entirety? Your comment here about them being copyists of copyists must have referred to the consonants because they were not copying vowels right?

As I said before, they had respect for Deut 4:2 or did you miss that bit? Have you a parchment that goes in a mesuzah? Are you aware of the rules governing this writing on this Goat's skin? Did you know that even if one letter is wrong the whole kaboodle is thrown away? Did you know that in the writing of the scroll for today's synagogue has to be written by a scribe who has to have impeccable standards and goes through years of training before he is allowed to even hold a stylus? Now do you suppose that these rules and regulations were invented in 1800? or 1900?

Galena wrote:
The masoretes undertook a monumental task that is pure genius, not even their doubtful disputations and questionable pointing on isolated issues has detracted one iota from the inspired word, its purpose, its meaning its intention. This is to their genius and their work.


Karl wrote: And I and others who question their points are not also genius? Isn’t that claim rather presumptuous on your part?

Probably, depends on how you understood what I just said.

Karl said: Commentaries are written by fallible men, therefore contain mistakes. One extensive set of commentary are the Masoretic points added to God’s Word by people who, from a Christian viewpoint, didn’t believe the text. Therefore, from a Christian viewpoint, there are two reasons to question the accuracy of those points.

Whoops now it's your turn to be presumptuous.....what exactly is this christian viewpoint? I really hate to have to do this, but I am rather short on evidence at the moment so here we go - Romans says that Israel has been blinded in part, notice that word "in part" this means that they have and indeed do have a measure of allegiance and respect and certainly belief in their scriptures, in fact I challenge you to tell me how much of the thirteen principles of Judaism faith you don't agree with, I anticipate your answer, you will only disagree with one half of one sentence, which means 12 and half of those principles you can not deny. This is blindness in part. All other nations are described as being in darkness. The masoretes were not deviously out to deny the messiah, if that is what you think, the had ample opportunity to do that with plenty of other scriptures, but leaving that aside, I would seriously love to see all your complaints by listing the verses. Finally, the masoretes did thoroughly and completely believe their own text, but belief and faith are two different things, the former you have no right to question them on that, the latter? well that is different matter and I have no right to even question that.

Is the challenge over? Only if you can not provide evidence of the terrible mistakes that the masoretes made, and only of you can not provide evidence about how unreliable and error prone they were. If you can not provide this evidence then yes, the challenge is over Karl.

Kindest regards to you
Chris

[kwrandolph]

Karl wrote: But he redefined those words and made them the center of his argument.

No he did not, he spent most of his analysis about scriptural verses and showed how there must have been some rudimentary pointing in those days, did you get beyond the first 5 or 6 pages or so? I wish I could post that paper here for others to critique.

Thanks to dyslexia, I can’t speed read. So when I read the first few pages and saw that they were Kwatsch (to use a German term) I stopped. I wasn’t about to read 80 pages of that.

Karl wrote : This is an illogical statement. Why should I accept the points, which were not even invented until over 1000 years after the last native speaker of Biblical Hebrew had died

My research had shown quite clearly that the masoretes did not invent the complete system, that they had some rudimenentary vowel pointing and notes from the soferim and the temple period,

Show me one document from the temple period that has points, and I’ll withdraw this objection. I’ll extend that to even documents from the bar Kochba era.

some things collated into the talmud also which was sometimes a commentary on the grammar, they had an array of "rudimentary grammatical notes"

Based on which language, medieval Hebrew or Biblical Hebrew?

to assist them in DEVELOPING a system of standardisation based on known biblical pronounciation,

How could they know Biblical pronunciation when it had not been spoken natively for a millennium?

a mixture of the vernacular and the medieval ways of re-citing verses.

So you admit that it was medieval?

This is what I have learned and this is what you say is wrong, fine.

I had to unlearn much of what I learned in class, because it was wrong.

This is what that paper, that I sent you, tries to explain also. Ironically it was what I had read from scholars of the DSS, the little that I did read, where they also inferred the likelihood of standardisation in pronounciation from as far back as Ezra in many words analysed, now the DSS may not have dots, and I am not a scholar of linguistics, but it is these people's careers and jobs to investigate this sort of thing.

Ezra lived about a century after the last native speaker of Biblical Hebrew had died. By Ezra’s time, most of the pronunciations would have been according to Aramaic, the language people spoke, and not according to Hebrew. Even those were subject to change. The New Testament (Byzantine tradition) preserves indications that the yokels from Galilee were behind the times in a shift of pronunciation that was occurring at that time. Other transliterations and vocalization schemes (the Masoretic points were not the only vocalization scheme) indicate other pronunciation changes. With all this evidence, the probability that the Masoretic points recreated Biblical era pronunciation is nil.

Karl wrote:You need to learn Hebrew, because an unpointed text delivers up a load of meaning. Often more than the pointed text.

This is often called ambiguity

Most of the ambiguity I’ve seen is in the MT, often caused by the points.

… I can prove to you a text where scholars are divided and yet they have their grammatical spectacles on - are you interested?

Do you want to start a thread on ambiguous passages?

… so they copied what was copied what had been copied what was previously copied, so what? How do you know that they did not preserve every letter in its utter entirety? Your comment here about them being copyists of copyists must have referred to the consonants because they were not copying vowels right?

The moment that you admit that they copied copies, that puts them at the mercy of the copyists who went before. And you have no evidence that they were as careful.

As I said before, they had respect for Deut 4:2 or did you miss that bit?

This is irrelevant, as the Talmudists and Karaites didn’t follow it.

Have you a parchment that goes in a mesuzah? Are you aware of the rules governing this writing on this Goat's skin? Did you know that even if one letter is wrong the whole kaboodle is thrown away?

Do you know that not one of those laws is written in Torah from Moses? And for them to insist on them today violates Deut 4:2 and 13:1?

Did you know that in the writing of the scroll for today's synagogue has to be written by a scribe who has to have impeccable standards and goes through years of training before he is allowed to even hold a stylus? Now do you suppose that these rules and regulations were invented in 1800? or 1900?

Do you not know that all of these are totally irrelevant to the question of whether or not the Masoretic points accurately recreate Biblical era pronunciations?

Is the challenge over? Only if you can not provide evidence of the terrible mistakes

I never claimed “terrible mistakes”, you are adding to what I said.

that the masoretes made, and only of you can not provide evidence about how unreliable and error prone they were. If you can not provide this evidence then yes, the challenge is over Karl.

You didn’t object to Proverbs 1:19.

I told you at the outset that I had not made a list of points that are wrong, that was not my intention. I just stopped using them, well over a decade ago. On my computer today, I have the text in the Hebrew alphabet, not the Aramaic square characters used in the late second temple era and afterwards. There’s no room in the Hebrew alphabet for the Masoretic points. From what I’ve heard, based also on archaeological evidence, the Hebrew alphabet was still used at the time of Ezra and for some time afterwards.

Kindest regards to you
Chris

Karl W. Randolph.