Terryl Givens Letter To A Doubter

[Robert F. Smith]

Would not the Icelander study apply to one family's line among many others, as would be the case if the Lehites entered a populated land?

And just to be clear, when you said "no descendants" you mean "no genetic descendants", right?.... that there may be known actual blood descendants of these individuals but the genetic DNA line has been lost, they don't share DNA markers with their descendants.

The Lehites were entering a region inhabited by peoples with foreign DNA. Even with some intermarriage (unusual for elites) the native gene pool would be largely unaffected, and it would be nearly impossible to find Israelite DNA present 1500 years later. For that we would need skeletal remains from the actual Book of Mormon period -- the earlier the better.

The Icelanders and Maori were living among families who shared the same ethnicity, even if not the same matrilineages or patrilineages. Some families simply die out with no descendants. In Iceland, for example, tremendous volcanic eruptions and severe weather decimated the population. The gene pool remains homogeneous in such cases.

[volgadon]

The Massoretic consonantal text at Ruth 3:2 has hsʿrym, which can be read either “the barley” or “the gates,” with “house” in parallel to “gates” in both Hebrew and Ugaritic (Psalm 122:1-2; ʿAnat:II:3-4; UT 1007:5-6) – the “threshing-floor” of Araunah/Ornan being the location on which David built an altar (II Samuel 24:11-25, I Chronicles 21:15-29), and on which Solomon built his temple in Jerusalem.

Fantastic post.

The Masoretic text of Ruth has so many of those ketiv/keri issues that it is not even funny.

Back in the days of an only TV station in Israel, we had celebrity linguists. For the heck of it, I'll post a clip from the iconic show "Hegiah Zman Lashon," discussing archaic linguistic elements in Ruth.

[Robert F. Smith]

Fantastic post.

The Masoretic text of Ruth has so many of those ketiv/keri issues that it is not even funny.

Back in the days of an only TV station in Israel, we had celebrity linguists. For the heck of it, I'll post a clip from the iconic show "Hegiah Zman Lashon," discussing archaic linguistic elements in Ruth.

Thank you for that, yedidi,

It reminds me of one of my roommates at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem (we were living on Mt Scopus) who sang the entire Song of Songs from memory. There are those who likewise consider it to be a matter of esoteric ritual in a Garden of Eden setting. Of course one brings to the text what one already knows.

[Calm]

The Lehites were entering a region inhabited by peoples with foreign DNA. Even with some intermarriage (unusual for elites) the native gene pool would be largely unaffected, and it would be nearly impossible to find Israelite DNA present 1500 years later. For that we would need skeletal remains from the actual Book of Mormon period -- the earlier the better.

The Icelanders and Maori were living among families who shared the same ethnicity, even if not the same matrilineages or patrilineages. Some families simply die out with no descendants. In Iceland, for example, tremendous volcanic eruptions and severe weather decimated the population. The gene pool remains homogeneous in such cases.

So even though the results are the same...loss of a specific genetic identity, you see the cases as sufficiently different they should not be pointed to as related?

And again when you say "no descendants" do you mean no blood descendants at all or no genetic descendants present among their blood descendants (I was under the impression the Icelander study showed through records there were blood descendants for those whose genetic identity had been lost, but it's been awhile since I read it)?

[Calm]

Fantastic post.

The Masoretic text of Ruth has so many of those ketiv/keri issues that it is not even funny.

Back in the days of an only TV station in Israel, we had celebrity linguists. For the heck of it, I'll post a clip from the iconic show "Hegiah Zman Lashon," discussing archaic linguistic elements in Ruth.

I would have thought the words would have moved from right to left across the screen instead of like English from left to right.

Not knowing Hebrew, there is not much more info I could get out of it.

Edited November 6, 2012 by calmoriah

[volgadon]

I would have thought the words would have moved from right to left across the screen instead of like English from left to right.

Not knowing Hebrew, there is not much more info I could get out of it.

Surpisingly enough, it actually makes it easy to read individual words from right to left. Though, truth be told, never noticed until you mentioned it.

Yechiel Safra, the guy in the white shirt, recites parts of Ruth 3 using one of the Ashkenazic melodies intended only for it and the Song of Songs.

THe long and short of it is that the written form form has Naomi giving Ruth instructions using what looks like first-person singular. I went, I laid down, etc., but those forms had mostly died out of Hebrew by Massoretic times so they ignored the ending and punctuated the text as the read it. The archaic form, however, has parallels in Arabic.

[noel00]

I did a couple of semesters with Anderson at the University of Queensland years ago. I asked him what he thought of the computer aided study done at BYU in Isaiah. His response was that it was very inadequate.

[volgadon]

I did a couple of semesters with Anderson at the University of Queensland years ago. I asked him what he thought of the computer aided study done at BYU in Isaiah. His response was that it was very inadequate.

No doubt he'd have considered very inadequate a work referencing Rabbi Yalqut Shimoni.

[noel00]

He was one of those people who the University News said exist once a century. I remember seeing some of his books in his library translated into other languages. He had an assistant who did his PHd on the Book of Revelation. The Isaiah problem does not seem to be a problem for most evangelical scholars now.

[Robert F. Smith]

So even though the results are the same...loss of a specific genetic identity, you see the cases as sufficiently different they should not be pointed to as related?

And again when you say "no descendants" do you mean no blood descendants at all or no genetic descendants present among their blood descendants (I was under the impression the Icelander study showed through records there were blood descendants for those whose genetic identity had been lost, but it's been awhile since I read it)?

I don't know what you mean by "genetic identity."

Again, all the Maoris were Maori, all the Icelanders were the descendants of ancient Vikings/Norsemen -- of one ethnicity in each case. Lehi and clan entered a land with foreign ethnicities, i.e., they shared no close DNA relationships with them. These situations are strikingly different.

When I speak of particular families which have no heirs/descendants, I mean that demographic disasters killed off so many families that the matrilineal and patrilineal lines were lost to genetics. It is possible to lose mtDNA and paternal DNA, even when there are some descendants, but the ethnic relations shown via DNA would not be lost when there is a homogeneous population (as separately among the Maori and the Icelanders).. There are different types of DNA testing.

Edited November 9, 2012 by Robert F. Smith