Hebrew typo question....

The section William is referring to is shown below:

He's suggesting that the word on the right -- 'at -- should have a qaamats (shown below - the "T" symbol) rather than the sh'waa' (the colon-looking symbol).

 I will have to research that, but I thought I would post the above so others can weigh in...

I will admit that having a dagesh-taw at the end of a word is unusual (usually you would have a taw without the dagesh--the dot in the center). This indicates to me that perhaps the dagesh is a dagesh forte rather than a dagesh lene. However, I would then expect more vowel than the virtually unvoiced sh'waa' at the end. It is somewhat strange, but that doesn't mean it is incorrect. There are certain rare rules in Hebrew that crop up from time to time and this is probably one of those. That said, I'm not sure either way at this point.

David Paul said:

The section William is referring to is shown below:

He's suggesting that the word on the right -- 'at -- should have a qaamats (shown below - the "T" symbol) rather than the sh'waa' (the colon-looking symbol).

 I will have to research that, but I thought I would post the above so others can weigh in...

I will admit that having a dagesh-taw at the end of a word is unusual (usually you would have a taw without the dagesh--the dot in the center). This indicates to me that perhaps the dagesh is a dagesh forte rather than a dagesh lene. However, I would then expect more vowel than the virtually unvoiced sh'waa' at the end. It is somewhat strange, but that doesn't mean it is incorrect. There are certain rare rules in Hebrew that crop up from time to time and this is probably one of those. That said, I'm not sure either way at this point.

Both of these can be correct.  I'm not sure how they label them so I can't unequivocally say that they are correct.  See Jdg 4.20 for the form וְאָמַרְתְּ which is analogous to שָׁמַרְתְּ which is a qal perf 2 fem sg with waw prefix.  I should note that שָׁמַר in the form שָׁמַרְתְּ does not appear in the Hebrew bible.  For אָתְּ see Gen 12.13.  It is a 2nd fem sg pronoun.

David Paul said:

Just so you know, William, most others (using typical willy-nilly transliteration) will probably spell qaamats as either qamats or qamatz or kamats or kamatz. I have created my own translit method that uses a one-to-one scheme and provides English to Hebrew and Hebrew to English (including the niqquudh -- "vowel points") with virtually 100% accuracy. That is a claim that NO TRANSLIT METHOD ANYWHERE CAN CLAIM...primarily because most H2E translit has no method...it is random and haphazard at best. My system, as I said, allows for unique one-to-one translit for each consonant and vowel (except for extremely rare niqquud, for which I am still working out various options).

The easiest way is to simply avoid transliterating at all -- simply use Hebrew characters (or more correctly Aramaic square characters).

William Bingham said:

David,

Thanks for that word.....qaamats.   Just for further information....the you guarded that you posted is correct.....its actually the one above it with the Ahtah.....not the Aht.....It was the you (masc) singular not you (fem) singular.

 

 

If you are in any doubt, you are right. It is probably a typo even if you can find a strange form in the OT ending with the  consonant t (the last "shewa" simply means there is no vowel). The reason for that being that the book is a primer and therefore does not deal with oddities but with the unmarked forms. The normal conjugation for the Qatal second person masc is קָטַ֫לְתָּ and sometimes קָטַ֫לְתָּה.

David Paul said:

is that why words ending in the final Kapph (Kaf) such as derekh and haalakh have a sh'waa' at the end?

David  the answer to this question of "why" is difficult because all we have is the text and we can only speculate what intentions or reasons the Masoretes had in adding the vocalisation marks. The Masoretes had a consonantal text in front of them. They also had a reading tradition which preserves very ancient phenomena as well as late developments. They combined the two. You observe correctly that they need not have added the shwa at the end. If you do not indicate something at certain places which have something in common while at the same time you indicate various other features in different places, your omission of an overt sign is actually an indication of the remaining option.

Why did the Masoretes explicitly signify the lack of a vowel after the final consonants תand ך if they thought it was obvious after all the other final consonants?

    I think the consonantal text which the Masoretes had in front of them did not fit their reading tradition. For example, their reading tradition signified the masculine second person attached pronoun by a long "a" vowel. Such traditions can be found in Qumran and even in several ancient inscriptions as well as in certain occurrences in the MT (38 as far as I know) as in Nu 22:33. So the Masoretes superimposed their reading tradition on top of a text of a different kind by adding the vowel sign after the final letter (See a similar phenomenon in  the Qere perpetuum נַעֲרָ). I think they felt there was a problem with this anomalous practice which is why they felt the need to  always add the shwa redundantly after the letter  ך and also after the letter ת in perf. 2nd sg. fem. forms of strong verbs.

Unfortunately I cannot travel back to the eighth century and ask them :-)