Karl: > my first criterion is theological, named here the belief in Biblical > inerrancy . . . > today I see an advantage in not having the language of Ben Sira infect > and weaken my knowledge and understanding of Biblical Hebrew. In > other words, today I would rather give up the chance for comparative > linguistics, than lose my facility in Biblical Hebrew.
Karl, I support you in holding to your inerrancy claim. There is nothing in my proposals that should detract you from that. But we do read the content of the texts and the literary intentions differently. Probably a majority of members of ETS OT-profs accept inerrancy and date Qohelet late. Or maybe a minority. I don't know. Franz Delitsch, certainly not Friedrich, would probably have been in that camp from an earlier era. Here, my concern is your "facility" in BH. You've apparently run through the BH text twenty plus times, dissolving everything into roots and some morphological categories that you learned from 'first year Hebrew'. That is not the same thing as an internalized language and no Semitic language works in the way that we sometimes see argued in your posts. Most of the time this doesn't surface in an English email about Biblical Hebrew, sometimes it is only visible from seeing that a proposal cannot consistently work within the whole language, but sometimes the proposal is small enough and definible enough that it can be relatively 'easily' handled on a list like this. Most recently, your comments on hatsil, and habenu הבנו as "let's deliver", fit that category and were 'classic examples' that reflect a 'non-viable' language, mixing roots and 'first year categories' without reflection if the language works as presented. It becomes worrisome if projected into how one would read the rest of the HB. Further, by refusing much information from the community that has used BibHebrew continuously for 3000 years, and from the linguistic community that can tighten up and verify much of that history, a person risks creating a unique, non-viable, "corrupt language". You appear to be developing a 'non-human/non-BH/artificial' language. Ironically, this is the very thing that you wish to avoid. I'll send another email, dealing with a couple of details in your last email on Qohelet. I realize that the above is only 'my opinion' and that you differ. Mentioning that I speak other languages wouldn't help either, because everyone on this list does. And everyone makes mistakes, too, for many different reasons, even in a mother-tongue. However, hatsil, habenu 'let's deliver' and the points in the next email would be data for seeing how the 'philosophy of BH', and its application, can be evaluated. blessings Randall Buth -- Randall Buth, PhD www.biblicallanguagecenter.com Biblical Language Center Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life _______________________________________________ b-hebrew mailing list [email protected] http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
