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Re: Epphatha Qs

From:Leo Caesius <leo_caesius@...>
Date:Monday, June 21, 2004, 16:38
On May 19, 2004, at 5:15 AM, Emily Zilch wrote:
>{ Doug Dee } "7:34 And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto >him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened." >so, which cunning linguist can identify the aramaic original form of >this? >no, really. i want to know. >em'ly
Steg replied: "It looks like a reflexive |itpe`al| form, from the root |PTHh|, with assimilation of the |-t-| to the first root consonant... something like [?ipp@taX\] (i hope /X\/ is the proper way to write voiceless pharyngeal fricative), probably. Unfortunately i can't find an Aramaic grammar around here to check for sure." Steg's right. It's an ethpaal (tD). In Late Aramaic (in this case, Christian Palestinian) the reflexive forms with t- are on their way out, and the marker has assimilated in most cases. In Aramaic as in Hebrew, roots with an initial sibilant undergo metathesis (Mod. Mandaic eStabyon, "they were baptized") and these are the only ones that survive. Otherwise, the reflexive is eventually replaced with the indicative form of the verb + some word that means "oneself," usually some variation on nafsh- (Mod. Mandaic "an navshe qagaatelni!" "I'll kill myself!"). I've looked in my Jastrow, and I see that Babylonian Talmudic preserves both forms (with and without prefixed t-; vowels: hireq, patah, patah; dageshes in the peh and the tav). Interestingly, Jastrow says of this form that it generally means "to be restored to sight," at least in the BT. cheers _________________________________________________________________ FREE pop-up blocking with the new MSN Toolbar – get it now! http://toolbar.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200415ave/direct/01/

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Steg Belsky <draqonfayir@...>