To return to the original issue: Realistically, Shoshanah Damary (and with her all of us) sings SOVIY, SOVIY, and not SOBIY, SOBIY not because of her Yemenite roots, but because she intuitively feels that this is the right, integrated, way to pronounce it. It is to the consternation of all the grammar pundits and purists, but I agree with her. Even if the dot in the B of SOBIY is to "inform" the reader that this is a one for two, there is still no obvious reason why it should be read as an English B, and not as an English V.
I would not dare give a closed form definition to "Biblical" Hebrew, but in contrast to it, spoken Hebrew does not use the Waw "HAHIPUK", rarely (except in poetry) uses the Heh HA$ELAH, rarely uses A$ER, refrains from using heavily inflected words, and is strict on tense. Isaac Fried, Boston University On May 18, 2011, at 9:35 PM, K Randolph wrote: > Isaac: > > What is your definition of Biblical Hebrew? It sounds as if it is > very different from mine. > > Karl W. Randolph. > > On Wed, May 18, 2011 at 6:27 PM, Isaac Fried <[email protected]> wrote: > There is no evidence that Biblical Hebrew was ever a spoken language. > > Isaac Fried, Boston University > _______________________________________________ b-hebrew mailing list [email protected] http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
