Question on the name Samuel from 1 Sam 1:20

[Refael Shalev]

Karl,
I think that you refer to ancient hebrew (or biblical times hebrew). Biblical hebrew comes along with the masoratic niqqud. Without any demonstration of "correct " pronunciation and the pretext to follow it no one can understand your point of view, and I must add that it's likely that the majority won't accept your claims because the lack of hard evidence and the fail to understand the advantages in your pronunciation mainly because of your prior claims about hebrew .

David,
We can say that in early times the dagesh in "LB" was structural and later on expanded the biliteral root to triliteral.

[ducky]

By the way, I guess you already know that in Archiology, the suffix of "him" is always with ה and not with ו (as the common Biblical way)
(his slave עבדה in archiology vs. עבדו in the bible most of the times)

The Siloam Inscription, one of the few that I have seen, has ו for the third person singular suffix.

you're talking about the word רעו.
This is probably no "re'o" - but to be read "re'u"
רעהו->רעו
re'ehu->r'eu.
a drop of the H and a "shrink" of the word.
This case doesn't seem to indicate about a made process for the suffixed forms since it seems that it is the word רעהו in the specific accent of the writer.
And especially when this script is the only one that one can point at.
And even if you still stick to that, then it still would be a single case.

And with that, you still need to face the fact that the biblical way is different than the way of the authentic scripts at that time.

To clarify it further,

The suffix "Him" in the Archiology is letter H=ה.
In the Bible, there are a few ways, but the common one is with Letter W/V=ו. (and sometimes, the same word can get two ways).
But for some words in the bible, there is only one way.
The word רע is always (actually with one exception) רעהו.
So when we see the word רעו in the archiology, it is hard to claim that it is like the common way of the bible. Because even if it was, then it is weird that when archiology took the "biblical way", it uses it on a word that even the bible doesn't give it a W suffix.
Because the Bible, for this word, write רעהו.

There is one case in Jer. 6:21 when it is written רעו (and not רעהו). And I saw once in Dss, and later in the Talmud and so on.
But we see the common biblical way רעהו.
And so it is hard to see רעו in the Archiology as a form that uses W as a suffix (in a grammatical way) because we know that it is not the way in archiology scripts, and also, if it is some sort of exception, then it is odd that the word that is used that way is the word that the Bible's common way is different.
And then we would expect to see that form in the bible at least a few times as an alternative way (because this is a common word).

[kwrandolph]

I can’t believe that this is a serious statement, given the history of those two languages.

This is how I feel about almost everything you say.

LOL!

(I really did laugh out loud when I read that.) I have the same opinion about much of what you write, and so far you have given me no reason to change my opinion.

Oh you’re one of those. That you cannot imagine the Bible without the Masoretic points.

If anyone should be warned against misrepresentation, it is you. Are you not aware that Torah scrolls in the synagogue are handwritten without vowels or any diacritics? The most revered text among Jews has no vowel points written on it. Therefore, "that you cannot imagine the Bible without the Masoretic points" is clearly an absurd position for you to take.

I think this may be the first reference to synagog practice in this forum. It’s been so long since I’ve seen any reference to that synagog practice that it slipped my mind.

Apparently I misunderstood your statement. Previously there were those on this forum who flat out stated that without the Masoretic points, there is no Biblical Hebrew. From your statement, I understood you to be making the same claim. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

An example of what appears to be a claim that without the Masoretic points, there is no Biblical Hebrew, is found below.

However, to say that all printed editions of the Bible have vowel points, but that the language in the Bible is NOT the biblical language makes absolutely no sense. The Bible (the Bible - yes, the Bible) has vowel points in it. Period. To call it anything other than the BIBLICAL language is foolishness.

Now it appears that you contradict your paragraph above.

The consonantal text is Biblical, the Masoretic points are not.

It has probably been a couple of decades since I started reading the Bible on a computer rather than on paper. The first Hebrew Bible I found that I could download and read on my computer had no points, though it did distinguish between the Sin and Shin. On computers where I can control even which font to use, I use a font based on the Gezar Calendar. I find that font easier to read than the Aramaic square characters used by moderns. Downloading from places like crosswire.org allows me to carry more than one version on a device as small as an iPod Touch that fits in my shirt pocket. One of those versions, the Aleppo text, doesn’t distinguish even between the Sin and Shin, nor does it have any of the other Masoretic points. When I have a question on the text, I check the DSS, none of which have any Masoretic points. Therefore, when I think of Biblical Hebrew, it has no points.

I cannot imagine that you've done yourself any favors.

On the contrary, by not following the points, I have freed myself from medieval commentary (yes, the points are commentary) by people who didn’t believe the text so that I can examine the text critically.

Just imagine how much we could accomplish on this forum if it weren't crowded by people telling us to reject everything that we know about Hebrew at every step.

To me, this sounds like you should look in a mirror.

Imagine what could be shared, how many people could be introduced to the language and to the Bible, how we could re-invent this online space... if only we didn't have to argue every day that the text should be understood as it stands, that the vowel points reflect something sensible, that we can actually pronounce the words as written, that we don't need to give a pronunciation-less text to students of the biblical corpus. Imagine a B-Hebrew that just functioned! Imagine a place where we didn't get tied up in such dumb arguments every single day. What a world that would be! What a world, indeed.

Are you claiming here that things would be so much better by ignoring linguistic research, refusing to correct hoary mistakes, blindly repeating “experts”, and similar practices?

Karl,
I think that you refer to ancient hebrew (or biblical times hebrew). Biblical hebrew comes along with the masoratic niqqud.

See above. Show me the points in the synagog scrolls and in the DSS.

Without any demonstration of "correct " pronunciation…

That’s the problem. All too often the Masoretes’ chosen “correct” pronunciations are demonstrably wrong.

and the pretext to follow it no one can understand your point of view,

??? Huh?

and I must add that it's likely that the majority won't accept your claims because the lack of hard evidence

That’s not the usual reason for rejecting new ideas. I’ve been around scientists enough to know that they usually are closed-minded to anything that goes against their pet beliefs. It usually doesn’t matter how good is the evidence.

and the fail to understand the advantages in your pronunciation mainly because of your prior claims about hebrew .

What prior claims about Hebrew?

David,
We can say that in early times the dagesh in "LB" was structural and later on expanded the biliteral root to triliteral.

I think you are right on this question. In doing the research for my dictionary, it appears that many bilitteral roots were expanded to trilitteral roots. How many with a final ה, a medial ו or י or geminate roots are really expanded bilitteral roots, and how many are naturally that way? I guesstimate that it would take a decade research effort to answer this question.

Karl W. Randolph.

[Refael Shalev]

How you pronounce the word אביו for example, and why like that?

[Jason Hare]

Are you claiming here that things would be so much better by ignoring linguistic research, refusing to correct hoary mistakes, blindly repeating “experts”, and similar practices?

Ignoring linguistic research? When was the last time you read a research article regarding the subject of linguistics and the biblical Hebrew language? I was under the impression that you rejected all research in this area.

[kwrandolph]

How you pronounce the word אביו for example, and why like that?

Good question. How did the ancients during the Biblical era pronounce אביו?

One of the very few transliterations that I’ve seen from the Biblical era, from about 800 BC, has לבי “lion” transliterated as “labaya”. Every consonant followed by a vowel. So taking that as a pattern, could אביו have been pronounced something like “abayewu”? This is just a guess based on minimal information.

Do you have any transliterations from the Biblical era that can give clues to its pronunciation?

Karl W. Randolph.

[Jemoh66]

Karl,

What you are doing is rejecting the masoretic pointing wholesale, and in so doing you are turning a blind eye to the treasure of linguistic data. Having studied applied linguistics, What I see in the preserved Tiberian pronunciation is actual observable evidence of phonological change over time.

The Dagesh for me screams preservation of ancient Hebrew pronunciation as well as an even more ancient phonological development.

We know from cognate languages and from internal BH evidence that BH speakers geminized consonants through compensatory lengthening. BH speakers in a parallel to modern Italian geminized the consonant that assimilates a neighboring consonant.

Notice for example how English speakers preserve the /k/ in fact while modern Italians pronounce the word fatto.
This happened in northwest Semitic cognate languages as well. BH speakers did not tolerate a nasal clustered with a following consonant and so we have as an example /bat/, daughter which has dropped the /n/ preserved in cognate languages /bint/. Even in modern Swahili daughter is still /binti/.

So when a linguist sees a geminized /t/ in nathatti. Knowing the root contains III-nun, we can see that by the time the consonantal text was written, Hebrew has undergone the assimilation of the /n/ into the /t/ of the 1sr person subject agreement marker -/ti/, and through compensatory lengthening they geminized the /t/.

The masoretic pointing in this case is clearly preserving an early phonological phenomenon.

On the other hand we can also see post biblical phonological changes like the /a/-/i/ vowel shift which seems to have occurred as late as 400 AD.
Examples: batyah —> bityah, magdal—> migdal

[Jason Hare]

[​C​]ould אביו have been pronounced something like “abayewu”? This is just a guess based on minimal information.

I would say that reductio ad absurdum would lead to an untenable position, but you've done it for me. Such extreme and unnecessary skepticism puts you in the position of not even knowing how one would pronounce a word so common as "his father." You cannot pronounce אָבִיו, yet you claim to have a more tenable position than those who teach their students to read the vowels as written.

As anyone in their second week of Hebrew 101, and they will be able to tell you that אָבִיו is pronounced aviv without hesitation.

[ducky]

If we want to go back, then אביו is based on אב=ab (of course).

Semitic words has suffix vowels (cases).
Hebrew, mostly lost them.
But in some word, the cases stayed when the form gets longer.

This word אב uses its suffix case - and with this case, it is אבי=abi.

when we want to give the form אבי a possessive pronoun of "him", we add the letter H (+a vowel "u")=hu --- but the vowel is short and the W is not written.

and so, we get אביה - abihu
But even though the vowel is short, Hebrew kept that vowel by writing it אביהו (with a W letter).
For example: Judges 14:10 וירד אביהו and so on.

This form of אביהו (abihu) had a process of dropping the H.
(The H, between two vowels, tends to fall).

and so, we got abihu-->abiu.
Now we have a diphthong of "iu".
This type of diphthong turns to W. (iu-->w)

And so, abiu-->abiw.

in the late era, the letter B, when it came after a vowel, lost its blocking sound, and was turned airy (influenced by the vowel) - something as "bh" which then later turned to V.

The letter W, in times was pronounced (but not in every place) as V.

And so we got - Aviv.

ab/abi+hu
abihu-->abiu-->abiw-->aviv

So the biblical way of אביו was "abiw"
which is an evolution of "abihu"
and we can see the two forms in
Judges 14:9 אביו
Judges 1410 אביהו

*************************
As for לביא
Where did you see the opinion of labaya?
sound to me a little bit odd.

[Jason Hare]

I approach everything with an eye of "how can I teach this to a first-year student?" and "how can a first-year student acquire this feature of the language?"

There is no way to teach a student a language that lacks an authoritative pronunciation. It just doesn't work. Having no pronunciation and just reading symbols without vocalization is like not teaching a language at all. It's useless. From a pragmatic and pedagogic standpoint, your proposal is worthless. You must teach a pronunciation, and it is reasonable to use the pronunciation that THE WHOLE WORLD uses to communicate with one another.