Carthaginians speaks Hebrew?

[amir]

Whats the difference between the phoenicians and the carthaginians? is it the same nation that just changed their name?



and at bar kochva:
I'm no scholar, haven't even graduated high school yet but it does seem logical that biblical hebrew and the phoenician language would be similar. The bible isn't the most accurate history book in existence but as far as I recall from it, the phoenicians were already in kna'an when the jews came. It is also pretty safe to assume that the bible was written way after they initially arrived. given the fact that they lived alongside with them for quite some time until the bible was actually written, it does seem logical that they would be affected by them and hebrew would become far more similar to the phoenician language.






I also do not see the point in all that dividing to modern hebrew and biblical hebrew. Any native tongue modern hebrew speaker should have no problem understanding biblical hebrew. modern hebrew is heavily based on biblical hebrew, and again I just dont see the reason to differentiate them and say something like punic relates to ancient hebrew not modern.

[Cimon]

Whats the difference between the phoenicians and the carthaginians? is it the same nation that just changed their name?

Carthaginians were originally Phoenician colonists, who then became more powerful than their mother city.

[Tellos Athenaios]

I also do not see the point in all that dividing to modern hebrew and biblical hebrew. Any native tongue modern hebrew speaker should have no problem understanding biblical hebrew. modern hebrew is heavily based on biblical hebrew, and again I just dont see the reason to differentiate them and say something like punic relates to ancient hebrew not modern.

Well... modern Greek is surprisingly similar to ancient versions if Attic or Ionic are anything to go by... Yet to 'the' ancient Greek, his modern cousin will most certainly be talking in a most Barbaric tongue. I think, with the influence of Yiddish (influenced by German & Slavic languages, for crying out loud) and similar dialects; 'the' ancient Jew would've been flabbergasted by the sheer gibberish-ness of modern Hebrew.

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

@ Amir

Im going to say what im going to say about this but i really really really dont want to get into any other tangents in this thread.

"it does seem logical that biblical hebrew and the phoenician language would be similar."

Yep just like hebrew and aramaic and arabic and any of those languages there.

"The bible isn't the most accurate history book in existence"

well that's what most people used to think. Im not going to debate this with anyone because it starts carrying theological bias in both directions but, to my knowledge any of the non miraculous stuff found in the Old Testament has largely been backed up by archeology, alot of which has happened in the last 50 years. So... it isnt the most accurate history book in existence but it's probably the most accurate history book ever produced by antiquity by far.

"It is also pretty safe to assume that the bible was written way after they initially arrived."

says who? that old theory is breaking down also.

"given the fact that they lived alongside with them for quite some time"

actually they either exterminated or enslaved them whenever possible so...

"it does seem logical that they would be affected by them and hebrew would become far more similar to the phoenician language."

...i dont know how logical that is.

I know that this is nittpicky of me and therefore im not gonna pick at the second part of your post, nor do i care to being as i've gotten my original point across in the previous few posts ive had. Truth is i shouldn't have bothered responding here anyways as this is totally way off the topic that i had wanted to get involved in.

Im pretty sure im right about this, and im pretty sure this is gonna turn into a whole other sub-argument with other people and im not interested in doing that, so i'll just walk away from this and let you think what you want, but i'd advise you to look into the matter further in a way that allows for the reckoning of evidence on both sides of the issue, so that maybe you can form a few valid premises to start from and then employ unbiased logic to the evidence you will find, and hopefully you'll come to the truth of the matter and then teach all of us.

Moreover, I advise that Carthage must be destroyed.

[Hax]

So... it isnt the most accurate history book in existence but it's probably the most accurate history book ever produced by antiquity by far.

Histories, Polybios. To name one.

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

Hax i have an idea as to what you are saying, but that requires alot of guesswork on my part.

Im assuming you mean to say "Histories, written by polybios is a more historically accurate work than the bible, and it is from antiquity as well..."

Is that correct?

Operating under that assumption, i'll say: huh?
More accurate by which criteria? Is this simply greco-roman bias, biblical skeptism, a judgement call based on a higher level of detail, judgement call based on more complete archaeological corroboration, all of the above, none of the above, some of the above, some of the above plus more...?

like i said i dont want to debate that point because of pro-theological bias, anti-theological bias, antisemitism, ethnocentrism, etc etc etc.

why cant you just let my little comment slide? Look if you really want to fight about this, then define which criteria you are using to make that judgement.

Im basing my statement on the mountain of corroborative evidence to support the biblical account of places and events, which spanned close to 800 years, predated any western attempts at an organized history by far (assuming that herodotus is indeed the "father of history"), etc.

Im not familiar with Polybius' work so i cant speak at that, but im pretty sure you arent familiar with the bible so we are even :p.

i really didnt want to have to defend that statement made to amir, i just felt he wasnt paying the bible the proper homage for a historical work of its stature.

In closing ill say two things:

1. Polybius work came hundreds upon hundreds of years after the bible, it was written by one man covering a span of 60 years, it's not even in the same category, by making your comment you are trying to say that an automobile is better than a CPU, they are both machines but they are hardly comparable in form or function to make a comparison. You want to compare the bible to another history of antiquity stack it up against greek mythology, or the legends surrounding the founding of rome, or the gilgamesh epic, and then you are making comparisons in the same arena.

2. Moreover, I advise that Carthage must be destroyed.

[||Lz3||]

why cant you just let my little comment slide? Look if you really want to fight about this, then define which criteria you are using to make that judgement.

I think you're the one that reeaaaally wants to fight about this...

I have this -weird perhaps - way of visualizing posts in a forum , I actually "imagine" the other people's voices... and I imagine yours as one from a very angry man

[a completely inoffensive name]

For a guy with only 8 posts, you have made a bigger impact then I would have expected.

[Jolt]

Hax i have an idea as to what you are saying, but that requires alot of guesswork on my part.

Im assuming you mean to say "Histories, written by polybios is a more historically accurate work than the bible, and it is from antiquity as well..."

Is that correct?

Operating under that assumption, i'll say: huh?
More accurate by which criteria? Is this simply greco-roman bias, biblical skeptism, a judgement call based on a higher level of detail, judgement call based on more complete archaeological corroboration, all of the above, none of the above, some of the above, some of the above plus more...?

like i said i dont want to debate that point because of pro-theological bias, anti-theological bias, antisemitism, ethnocentrism, etc etc etc.

why cant you just let my little comment slide? Look if you really want to fight about this, then define which criteria you are using to make that judgement.

Im basing my statement on the mountain of corroborative evidence to support the biblical account of places and events, which spanned close to 800 years, predated any western attempts at an organized history by far (assuming that herodotus is indeed the "father of history"), etc.

Im not familiar with Polybius' work so i cant speak at that, but im pretty sure you arent familiar with the bible so we are even :p.

i really didnt want to have to defend that statement made to amir, i just felt he wasnt paying the bible the proper homage for a historical work of its stature.

In closing ill say two things:

1. Polybius work came hundreds upon hundreds of years after the bible, it was written by one man covering a span of 60 years, it's not even in the same category, by making your comment you are trying to say that an automobile is better than a CPU, they are both machines but they are hardly comparable in form or function to make a comparison. You want to compare the bible to another history of antiquity stack it up against greek mythology, or the legends surrounding the founding of rome, or the gilgamesh epic, and then you are making comparisons in the same arena.

2. Moreover, I advise that Carthage must be destroyed.

Is it me, or does it seems that for a Law Student, you seem pretty retarded (As in unable to make simple conclusions based on common sense). Let's see... the Bible is for all purposes, a religious book. As such, it contains thousands of elements which are false, for all we know. (Anything affected by spiritual or godly labour), just by that line, it loses much of it's credibility (Unless you truly believe that what happened in real history was that god split apart the waters of the Red Sea, and Moses fled Egypt through there). As to Polybios, he was an historian. It was his job to write history, and writting history means writting real history (Otherwise it would be a fantasy book). Now we don't really need much archaeological evidence on what he writes (Which there is, unless there would be a hiatus of 60 years in Roman history, which there isn't.), since as we know, the Romans themselves kept a great many records of what they did. And they together with the archaeological evidence corroborate most of Polybius works.

I also find it funny (I don't know, I seem to think, exceptions apart, the vast majority of americans says the dumbest of things.) And since I found so amusing your phrase "it's probably the most accurate history book ever produced by antiquity by far.", I ask how many books or works have you read which date from ancient history? And what are your criteria by which you nominate the Bible "the most accurate history book ever produced by antiquity"? Is it the publicity the Bible has that when pitted against other obscure (Alas! They have not created major religions!) Greek/Roman historical works makes you believe the Bible is actually more accurate? I am quite curious, since all I've seen until now is a parade of babbling flames

[amir]

OK, you got me Genesis isn't completely compatible with... well.. anything...


Now seriously, the bible is definitely far from a 100% accurate and objective book, yet you can't just say its all bullshit. First of all it's a collection of many books written at different times by different writers with many different characteristics.

The Melachim (Kings) books have in many occasions 2 reasons for everything it say. The first is "omg god is kewl and he does everything" and then there is a more or less standard explanation of what really(according to the writer) happened. Many Assyrian tablets were found on archeological excavations that fit very well with what said in these books. I'm too lazy to write a more through post, but in my school study book, on the chapter about Melachim, there are quotes of Assyrian or other tablets found that support and confirm what said in nearly every second chapter(that doesn't talk about a miracle or something of sort). So no, it is not a history book, and when numbering armies exaggerations are common, and yes Hebrew kings are probably displayed in it more powerful than they actually were, yet you cannot deny that the majority of events described in it(again, nonmiraculous events) have archeological findings supporting it.

Again I'm talking only about the Melachim books(though it is true to much of the Nevi'im(prophets) part of the bible).



Also I find it funny that I'm here sort of defending the bible... Usually I end up on the other side :P

[Ibrahim]

that's it-nobody attacks Hax, and gets away with it:

@bar khoba: get over it. and Hax referred to Polybios as being the most reliable historian around. he never said polybios discussed the bible-for all we know, he gave it about as much attention as he'd give an ant-none. his history was also about his timeperiod, not the biblical era.

and: religion=/= science, and science=/=religion. just because you happen to believe in the torah as a matter of faith, does not make it an actual historical book, no more so than my faith as a muslim makes a qur'an an actual historical book. i'm not saying its all myth (its based on history afterall), but these books were not intended to lecture on history, only to show the grandure of God. 'nuff said. if you don't get me by now, I suggest you stop arguing with the EB team...


also, If you must know a conclusive answer: yes, phoenician really is supposed to sound like Hebrew, and visca versa. the main differeces are(you don't have to read this, I added it to enlighten..EB may know more:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

1-hebrew(no not modern hebrew) retains the p- sound; phoenician, like arabic, shifted to an f by the EB timeframe. e.g shufet.. if an ancient hebrew read the phoenician shufet (ruling body), he'd say: shopet...

1-long a in proto semetic=> long o in hebrew, but long u in punic. shufet/ shopet, rus/ros (e.g. russadir, morocco). stressed a in proto semetic changed to a short o in punic, a wierd looking a in hebrew (blame IPA-rendered it an wierd a)

2-somewhat differing vocab. (duh?)
yeah, I'll confess, I used the same sources EB did(minus correspondance with khramallov), plus i looked into the way the romani rendered punic words(hebrew, latin, and phoenician had the same number of vowels apparently, and the same types of vowels-if you can get the hebrew cognate, consonents are easy). you can shoot me...

if they happen to have the same vocabulary, that's because they are of the same exact part of the semetic family branch; the north westrn semetic section, hebraic (or canaanite) sub-branch of that. the diff. between them is roughly the same as that between a kuwaiti's arabic, and moroccan (I could use maltese, but the vocab is 60 non-semetic). neither can really understand the other, and would require a translator...I'm referring to the spoken language, not the written.

3-do not think that modern hebrew can be used to accuratly assese another language of the semetic branch; in the attempt to revive it, several non semetic sounds were inrtroduced, to ease pronunciation to a yiddish/slavic audience, and many semetic ones were dropped, e.g, the 3ayn (IIRC, its like a glottal stop in modern hebrew), the sad (emphatic s-now rendered ts), the ta'(emphatic t-god knows what the heck happened to it), and the ha' (merged into kha'). ha' refers no to the h- sound, but to a pharyngeal sound. the fact that they (the letter representing those sounds)are even used in the bible proves that the modern pronunciation, lexicon, and some parts of grammar is nothing like trhat of ancient hebrew; only the vocabulary, morphology, and general syntax are intact. and don't get me started on v...you know modern hebrew is the only semetic tongue conclusively shown to have a v- sound, in native form? I looked all over, and only found it to have a v- sound
here is the IPA info (its off wikipedia, but, I can back it up at a moment's notice-or, since you speak it, you can see for yourself):

The pairs /b, v/, /k, x/ and /p, f/ have historically been allophonic. In Modern Hebrew, however, all six sounds are phonemic, due to mergers involving formerly distinct sounds (/v/ merging with /w/, /k/ merging with /q/, /x/ merging with /ħ/), loss of consonant gemination (which formerly distinguished the stop members of the pairs from the fricatives when intervocalic), and the introduction of syllable-initial /f/ through foreign borrowings.

...

[bovi]

if you don't get me by now, I suggest you stop arguing with the EB team...

He stopped.

[amir]

@ Amir

Im going to say what im going to say about this but i really really really dont want to get into any other tangents in this thread.

"it does seem logical that biblical hebrew and the phoenician language would be similar."

Yep just like hebrew and aramaic and arabic and any of those languages there.

"The bible isn't the most accurate history book in existence"

well that's what most people used to think. Im not going to debate this with anyone because it starts carrying theological bias in both directions but, to my knowledge any of the non miraculous stuff found in the Old Testament has largely been backed up by archeology, alot of which has happened in the last 50 years. So... it isnt the most accurate history book in existence but it's probably the most accurate history book ever produced by antiquity by far.

Perhaps I wasn't clear, I meant that while it is obvious not everything in the book is 100% true(world created in 7 days for example by our cool invisible guy...), it can still be a valid point of reference that is rather accurate about most other nonmiraculous things. So no need to convince me that is accurate :P

"It is also pretty safe to assume that the bible was written way after they initially arrived."

says who? that old theory is breaking down also.

The "tradition" is saying Melachim Alef was written by Yirmiyaho(630 BC)(I do not know the english name for him :O), at more or less the same time, other sources I've seen(and studied at school) said it was in around 560-600 BC, or later(after the exile). either way, quite some time after they arrived(supposedly around 1200 BC IIRC).

"given the fact that they lived alongside with them for quite some time"

actually they either exterminated or enslaved them whenever possible so...

"it does seem logical that they would be affected by them and hebrew would become far more similar to the phoenician language."

...i dont know how logical that is.

Well, if you agree that the bible does not invent nonmiraculous events, then Melchim Alef (Kings A) Chapter 5 states that there was some form of trade between the israelites and the phoenician king of the city Tyre(In order to build the first Bet Hamikdash(The Temple) Hiram the first sent quality woods and gold and in return Solomon sent wheat and oil yearly).

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

@LZ3

not really

@Mike

yeah well, the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about

@ Amir

misunderstood where you were coming from. I agree with what you said but i dont know how pervasive that linguistic influence would have been. But yeah ok, i'm in.

[Moros]

@LZ3

not really

@Mike

yeah well, the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about

@ Amir

misunderstood where you were coming from. I agree with what you said but i dont know how pervasive that linguistic influence would have been. But yeah ok, i'm in.

Polybios is known for using critique when using sources in comparison with other writers from the age (<=>Livius lol). If there's one history writer from the Ancient period that uses the best methods (viewed from the modern historic method) it probably was Polybios

The bible is an imporatant source, but not an acient historical work. It is based on oral traditions and nothing written in the bible has been due to any critique to check for it's accuracy. The only thing that happened was the selection of 4 gospels (New testament). But this was as much based on what they wanted Christianity to represent, political reasons,... as on trying to show the truth. Wether or not you are a christian. One cannot claim the bible has a proper method behind it. While Polybios for one had.