XPost: soc.culture.greek, soc.history.ancient, alt.pagan   
   XPost: alt.magick   
   From: ybg@TheWorld.com   
      
   In soc.history.ancient SolomonW  wrote in :   
   : On Mon, 2 Jul 2012 09:30:40 -0700 (PDT), Yusuf B Gursey wrote:   
      
   :> On Jul 2, 12:21 pm, Yusuf B Gursey  wrote:   
   :>> On Jul 2, 8:44 am, SolomonW  wrote:   
   :>>   
   :>>   
      
   :>>> I confess that clearly you know more than I do about this but let me make   
   :>>> one observation. There was a study done in England, tracing many famous   
   :>>> rabbis' travels. At the time (Greek and earlier Roman times) there were   
   two   
   :>>> main centers of Jewish studies; one center was in Iraq and the  other in   
   :>>   
   :>> Arabic got it from Aramaic or directly from Jews, who neighbor   
   :>> Palestine (there was no "Israel" at the time).   
   :>>   
   :>> at any rate, the reconstructions I gave are from Semitic linguistics   
   :>   
   :> actually Ashkenazi pronounciation is based on Mesopotamian Aramaic,   
   :> with its affricated tsade. an affricated tsade is tenable for Ancient   
   :> Hebrew, but it did have the "emphasis" (pharyngealization or   
   :> glottalization) present in Oriental pronounciations. Oriental   
   :> pronounciations are in general more conservative.   
      
   : I am sure that ancient biblical Hebrew was much more aligned to   
   : Mesopotamian then to what is today Oriental pronunciations.   
      
   Google is not releasing my post so I am answering again from a different   
   account.   
      
   what are basing your claim upon?   
      
   Mesopotamian recitations of Hebrew at the time of the Babylonian Talmud   
   were by and large similar to today's "Oriental" pronounciations. although   
   Babylonian Aramaic had a tendency to weaken the pharygeals (I don't think   
   Modern Iraqi jews have this tendency, being influenced by Arabic), ayin   
   and heth it still mostly preserved them. it also preserved the emphatics.   
      
   at any rate, Modern Israeli Hebrew, which is mostly based on European   
   recitations, has fewer sounds than is represented by the alphabet, ergo,   
   it cannot be conservative.   
      
   Biblical Hebrew had more phonemes than is represented in the alphabet. at   
   the time of the LXX to up to around the beginning of the 1st millenium at   
   least ayin and heth represented, along with the pharygeals /3/ and /H/   
   also represented /*gh*/ (Arabic ghayn) and /*kh*/ (Arabic kha)   
   respectively, but later became exclusively pharyngeals by the time of the   
   Masorites. we know that from transcription in to Greek especially the   
   LXX and transcriptions in cuneiform. further back, samekh and sin were   
   differentiated in sound.   
      
   even further back, one may assume that at least some Canaanite dialects   
   preserved some of the Semitic phonemes represented in Arabic, but these   
   are hard to determine.   
      
   don't smply assume that Hebrew as you know it is more conservative, but   
   learn Semitic linguistics. otherwise, you will end up like Aggie.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)