B-Hebrew: The Biblical Hebrew Forum

Hi Refael,

Yes, something like that (if I understand you).

There could be a shift in sound in a specific language for its reason, and that is a "personal" thing.

but when we talk about phonemes, we don't care how the languages chose to pronounce their sound, but all we care is the "groups" of phoneme and where are they "hiding" in the langauge - whether they are pronounced or not.

Thanks David!

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pm Hi Karl,

I don't understand why you moved to talk about Tiberian and so on, this has nothing to do with the subject that is way before Tiberian Hebrew

Oh? Where is your evidence within Hebrew for your claims from before Tiberian Hebrew?

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pmAnyway, I said it a few times, and if you really want to disprove what I say, all you need to do is to answer the question I asked.

I answered your question already, What part of my answer did you not understand?

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pmAnd then you teached me about the letter ש that was first was S, and then was splittet to Sh/S in Aramaic, and with that influenced Hebrew as well.

You really need to learn to read more carefully.

Within Hebrew during Biblical times the ש was one phoneme.

I’m no expert on Aramaic. Apparently ש in Aramaic had two phonemes because when Aramaic adopted the Hebrew alphabet, Aramaic had more phonemes than did Hebrew, and made one letter represent two or more phonemes.

Hebrew ceased being spoken as a native language around 500 BC. It was known only as a learned second language. Aramaic used the Hebrew alphabet. Within a few generations, Aramaic speaking Jews read Hebrew with Aramaic pronunciations, including giving ש the Aramaic two phonemes.

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pmAnd you will show me two groups of roots that are written with letter ש.
Group A: ש=S
Group B: ש=SH

Now me, as your student, do my homework, and I find out that the same differing of A and B that Aramaic did, are also found in Arabic and Ge'ez.

So? Now we’re talking about Aramaic, not Hebrew.

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pmI then come to class and ask you How is it possible that the differing that Armaic did in the late Biblical era, are found on other languages in the same roots.

How do you know that Aramaic had the two phonemes during Biblical times? Where’s your evidence?

ducky wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 12:41 pmHow is it that in Arabic, there are also two groups.
and the same roots that were "picked" to each group in Aramaic are similar to the roots that was picked to each group in Arabic.

If you have another answer than what I suggested, then it would be nice to hear it - maybe I miss something.

You are missing something:

1) Jews from about 500 BC and later spoke Aramaic as their mother tongue, not Hebrew. Hebrew was a learned, second language. Because Aramaic used the Hebrew alphabet, because Hebrew was a learned, second language, Jews read Hebrew with Aramaic pronunciations.

2) People speaking Aramaic and those speaking Arabic were in close communication from before 500 BC to the present. Therefore it’s possible that Arabic pronunciations influenced Aramaic pronunciations. Especially after the Muslim conquests. There was no degree of separation between the two languages.

3) Aramaic was the lingua franca from Persia to Egypt, therefore it was influenced by many languages, not only Arabic.

Your original argument is false. It ignores history. The evidence for your argument is based on practices first written down centuries after Biblical times.

Karl W. Randolph.

Hi Karl,

If I understand you correctly, you claim that ש pronounced in biblical hebrew as always "sh"?
What about words like סבך-שבך and סער-שער that indicate another pronunciation?

Hi Karl,

Without insulting, or something like that, Almost every sentence you wrote is wrong.

And it is also very clear to me that you're using terms that you don't even know what they mean (like Tiberian Hebrew, or sound/phoneme)

I started my comment by reffering to the statements you made, but I then thought that this thread would spread to a 100 pages.
So I though it is better for me to skip that.

**
I want to focus only about the subject itself, without reffering to the other stuff you wrote)

************
There is one thing that I thought you were saying, and I saw in your comment that I didn't understand you.
But then, in the same comment, you also questioned yourslef...?

I was getting very confused.

You wrote in your last comment that:

kwrandolph wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 9:18 am Apparently ש in Aramaic had two phonemes because when Aramaic adopted the Hebrew alphabet, Aramaic had more phonemes than did Hebrew, and made one letter represent two or more phonemes.

And that:

kwrandolph wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 9:18 am Hebrew ceased being spoken as a native language around 500 BC... Within a few generations, Aramaic speaking Jews read Hebrew with Aramaic pronunciations, including giving ש the Aramaic two phonemes.

So Here you claim that Aramaic had two sounds for the ש In the biblical times, and that the Hebrews, which had only one sound for the ש, adopted in the late biblical times the same two sounds for the ש as well.



But then, later in your comment, you asked me:

kwrandolph wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 9:18 am How do you know that Aramaic had the two phonemes during Biblical times? Where’s your evidence?

So now you question yourself about Aramaic having two sounds in the Biblical times?


You also said that:

kwrandolph wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 9:18 am People speaking Aramaic and those speaking Arabic were in close communication from before 500 BC to the present. Therefore it’s possible that Arabic pronunciations influenced Aramaic pronunciations. Especially after the Muslim conquests. There was no degree of separation between the two languages."

(What Islam Era has to do with it? the "Switch" was way before).

So you're saying that it could be that Aramaic was influenced by Arabic.
But In Arabic the sounds are the opposite than the Aramaic's.
If there was a direct influence (by close relationship), then surely the sounds would be in the same order.
So I don't understand your point.

And also, we have Ge'ez.
I guess they also had a relationship with Aramaic?
*************
You make a mess and I can't understand you.


*****

your last statement, by the way, shows that you didn't realize what I was saying. (Or that I couldn't explain myself well).


**************************************************
Instead of me trying to focus my question more and more.
Why don't you just tell me what you think about the letter ש

If you can, please try to do that shortly since you already wrote about the historical events (how you see it).

I am interested to know what is your theory about the letter ש and its sounds.

The claim that Hebrew represents one letter as two different "phonemes" may well be but a fallacy growing out of a basic misunderstanding of the working of the Hebrew language. One may hear that the letter ח (or the letter ש) in the words חָרַש, 'plow', and חֵרֵש, 'deaf', are distinct or different phonemes as it can not be that such two different words come from one and the same Hebrew root חרש.
Not so. Different Hebrew words derived from the same root need not have any "horizontal" connection whatsoever. The root חרש is a member of the family of roots
גרד, גרז, גרט, גרס, גרש
הרס
חרד, חרז, חרט, חרס, חרץ, חרש
כרס, כרץ, כרש, כרת
קרס, קרץ, קרש
All meaning 'cut, scrape, crash'.
Hence, a חֵרֵש is either of injured or damaged ears, or he is being one cut off from vocally communicating with others.
In Gen. 24:21
הָאִישׁ מִשְׁתָּאֵה לָהּ מַחֲרִישׁ לָדַעַת הַהִצְלִיחַ יהוה דַּרְכּוֹ אִם לֹא
NIV: "Without saying a word, the man watched her closely to learn whether or not the Lord had made his journey successful"
KJV: "And the man wondering at her held his peace, to wit whether the Lord had made his journey prosperous or not"
מַחֲרִישׁ may mean מכרית, "cutting off his stream of words and remaining silent", or it may mean "thinking, speculating, forging in his head ideas and expectations"

Isaac Fried, Boston University
www.hebrewetymology.com

I just have to say... any person who is new to Hebrew and comes upon this mess will be scared away. This is so counterproductive. It's against any hope of ever providing to anyone who doesn't already know Hebrew a way into the language.

To those who are just coming to the language: the real field of Hebrew study is not half as convoluted as what you see here. We have some really fringe theories that have taken over the majority of the bandwidth used by this forum, for whatever reason. Please, don't be scared off. If you want to learn the language, let me know, and we'll get you set up to study somehow.

ducky wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 12:22 pmYou make a mess and I can't understand you.

My fear is that a newcomer would feel like this about the entirety of the forum.

Hi Isaac,

I basically agree with the principle you make.

(but it is not always as you say, because two exact roots can evolve from the two different dominant letters/sounds.
I mean, as two roots as ABC -
one can evolved from AB and then was completed with C
and one can evolved from BC and then was completed with A.
And don't ask me for example because this is not the subject)

***
And by the way,
I think that all of these roots that you wrote are actually the same as קטע גדע and so on.
Which here, the "third letter" is the R that was pushed in the middle.

(but I don't know if all of the roots you wrote belong to the same "family"
and I don't know if you are right about the חרש case)

But anyway, even if you are (and let's say you are)
You talk about a very ancient state.

And I you also noticed, that these two roots use different ח and different ש in the other languages - in a clear match. that cannot be seen as a random way.

And to tell the truth,
I would expect that you actually won't have a problem about this "phoneme issue"
Because you already see the "same root" using real different letters - and you link them together with no problem.

So what is so odd for you to say that this חרש and that חרש are linked - And still are based on different phonemes?

I mean, you have no problem to see the "same root" with completely different letters, but it is bothering you if this "same root" can be seen with the same letters that only was origined from different phoneme?

You already saw that the ח and that the ש are different in these two roots.
So instead of them written with a different sign, they are just written with the same sign.

Hi Jason,

you're right.
But this forum is dry anyway.