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Re: Word Order in typology

From:Isaac A. Penzev <isaacp@...>
Date:Monday, October 18, 2004, 10:14
Ktebe Thomas R. Wier:


> Well, in that section, he's a little cagey about whether the > Judeo-Christian is the *right* theological explanation for linguistic > diversity, though clearly he spends most of his discussion (with the > token mention of the Popol Vuh) on it: there are 25 Bible citations, > mostly from Genesis.
It would be much fun to see any plausible explanation of language diversity based on Genesis 10. Until now I thought there were no professional linguists trying to speculate about such things. I'd love to, but I don't feel myself qualified enough ;)
> I note that he interprets John 1:1 ("In the beginning was the Word, > and the Word was with God, and the Word was God") as describing God's > inherently linguistic nature, but this is IMHO a bad example of exegesis.
Now THAT is really weird... He might have never read Targums that mention "memra" ('saying' in Aramaic) to denote God's personal acts in relation to the physical world... -- Yitzik "ve zot ha-torah asher sam moshe lifnei bnei yisrael"