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Copyright

Aaron D. Hornkohl

Published On

2024-11-11

Page Range

pp. 155–166

Language

  • English

Print Length

12 pages

9. FPL -ן versus - הָנ

  • Aaron D. Hornkohl (author)
Chapter of: Diachronic Diversity in Classical Biblical Hebrew(pp. 155–166)
The text discusses the prevalence and characteristics of the feminine plural (FPL) verbal suffix forms in ancient Hebrew. The dominant form across various ancient Hebrew sources, including the Tiberian biblical tradition and the Mishna, is vowel-final -נה. However, there exists a minority alternative, consonant-final -ן, whose presence and distribution within the biblical text, especially in the Masoretic tradition, is explored.
The analysis also presents statistical data illustrating the distribution of these forms in the Tiberian biblical tradition. It shows that vowel-final spellings dominate overall, while consonant-final forms are particularly concentrated in the Pentateuch. The text posits that these forms may reflect historical linguistic diversity in Hebrew that later evolved into a standardisation favouring vowel-final morphology. It suggests that the differing frequencies of consonant-final forms in the Torah compared to other biblical texts could indicate a preservation of older linguistic characteristics. The chapter concludes by raising questions about the implications of such morphological variation for theories of literary formation and textual transmission.

Contributors

Aaron D. Hornkohl

(author)
Associate Professor in Hebrew at University of Cambridge
https://www.ames.cam.ac.uk/people/dr-aaron-d-hornkohl

Aaron D. Hornkohl (PhD, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2012) is University Associate Professor in Hebrew, Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Cambridge. His research focuses on ancient Hebrew philology and linguistics, especially historical linguistics and ancient Hebrew periodisation; the components of the standard Tiberian Masoretic biblical tradition; and that tradition’s profile in the context of other biblical traditions and extrabiblical sources. This is his third single-author monograph after The Historical Depth of the Tiberian Reading Tradition of Biblical Hebrew (Cambridge: Open Book Publishers, 2023) and Ancient Hebrew Periodization and the Book of Jeremiah (Leiden: Brill 2014). He has also co-edited several volumes and written numerous articles.