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The characters are correct, but the interpretation of the meaning of the characters is phenomenally mistaken. Hebrew was never a pictographic language. It was alphabetic from the very beginning.
The characters are correct, but the interpretation of the meaning of the characters is phenomenally mistaken. Hebrew was never a pictographic language. It was alphabetic from the very beginning.
How do you know this, or do you suppose the author of that website is assuming that, since many cultures started with pictographs or hieroglyphics that this must be the case with the Hebrews and their language?...
How do you know this, or do you suppose the author of that website is assuming that, since many cultures started with pictographs or hieroglyphics that this must be the case with the Hebrews and their language?...
It is pure assumption, primarily continuing the theological speculation of mystical Judaism and the Jewish grammarians of the middle ages. There's simply no evidence for their claims that predate that speculation.
How do you know this, or do you suppose the author of that website is assuming that, since many cultures started with pictographs or hieroglyphics that this must be the case with the Hebrews and their language?...
To my knowledge, the world's fiirst writing systems were put to use in Mesopotamia (now Iraq) where cuneiform was being used. In Egypt hieroglyphics were in use.
The invention of the alphabet came in about 1525-1200 B.C. Of the early alphabets, the most significant were developed in Canaan. Although the earliest surving alphabet was created before the Phoenicians arrived in Canaan (about 1200 B.C), the Phoenicians produced the most extensive body of surviving texts using an alphabet. These texts date from about 1050-850 B.C. the writing system developed in ancient Canaan is referred to as the Phoenician alphabet. The Hebrew alphabet is its direct descendant.
1. Zephaniah does not prophesy the restoration of Hebrew at all. The Hebrew verb is not "restore," but "overthrow," meaning "change" here. It reflects a belief in a pure and divine language that would be imposed on the whole world so they could better serve God. There's no indication anywhere that anyone ever thought that Hebrew would ever be lost.
2. Paleo-Hebrew was not the language in Zephaniah's day. Paleo-Hebrew is the name scholars give to Hebrew that was written around the turn of the era in intentionally archaic script. Y'see, they used the Aramaic script after the exile, but there were still remnants of an earlier Hebrew script, and many scribes considered it more pious and significant to write using an older looking script. They didn't actually use the earlier script, but a variation on it, and when they intentionally use that older script to make their writings looks more important, we call it paleo-Hebrew. Zephaniah did not write in Paleo-Hebrew, he wrote in regular Hebrew with the Aramaic script.
3. Neither Modern Hebrew nor Biblical Hebrew have spiritual roots. They both have purely linguistic roots that borrow heavily from cognate languages. They are both thoroughly common languages. I guarantee you this person couldn't tell the difference between Biblical Hebrew and Moabite.
4. Each Hebrew letter did not have it's own semantic sense or meaning. The alephbet developed out of basic Northwest Semitic words, but those senses were absolutely not carried on by the letters in their use in spoken language.
5. The fact that Google Translator just transliterates the English word lava means absolutely nothing whatsoever vis-Ã -vis the difference between Biblical and Modern Hebrew. Biblical Hebrew also transliterates a lot of words from other languages.
6. This is grotesquely stupid and uninformed. It's pure garbage. This person knows absolutely nothing whatsoever about Hebrew. linguistics, phonetics, or lexicography. This is an absolute joke.
You almost forgot the the most annoying point.
7. The speaker had the most obnoxious cadence to his speech. It literally made my ears bleed.
It is pure assumption, primarily continuing the theological speculation of mystical Judaism and the Jewish grammarians of the middle ages. There's simply no evidence for their claims that predate that speculation.
When one researches, one must keep on their toes regarding agendas...It did look promising...Sort of like tracing Coptic back through all it's phases to hieroglyphics....Could you point me to a series on this speculation?...
When one researches, one must keep on their toes regarding agendas...It did look promising...Sort of like tracing Coptic back through all it's phases to hieroglyphics....Could you point me to a series on this speculation?...
The academic studies of this issue are not as broad as you probably want, but a couple examples of the early mystical interpretation of the consonants of the alphabet are here:
The academic studies of this issue are not as broad as you probably want, but a couple examples of the early mystical interpretation of the consonants of the alphabet are here:
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