Yahweh, The Hebrew Café

This post is just in passing to put out the word יַעְזֵר in Numbers 32:1. This is the verse in the MT:

וּמִקְנֶ֣ה ׀ רַ֗ב הָיָ֞ה לִבְנֵ֧י רְאוּבֵ֛ן וְלִבְנֵי־גָ֖ד עָצ֣וּם מְאֹ֑ד וַיִּרְא֞וּ אֶת־אֶ֤רֶץ יַעְזֵר֙ וְאֶת־אֶ֣רֶץ גִּלְעָ֔ד וְהִנֵּ֥ה הַמָּק֖וֹם מְק֥וֹם מִקְנֶֽה׃

In his zeal for declaring יהוה rightly to be pronounced as Yehovah, Neḥemia Gordon has stated (as have many) that the pronunciation יַהְוֶה cannot be an original Hebrew form because (1) the guttural will not take a silent sheva in the middle of a word and (2) the vocalization CaCCeh is not natural to Hebrew. Against this, we can call up words like יַבְנֶה Jabneh, אַרְבֶּה locusts, אַרְיֵה lion, and this toponym יַעְזֵר Jazer.

Essentially, if יַעְזֵר‎, יַבְנֶה‎, and יֶהְגֶּה‎ (shows begedkefet taking dagesh lene after closed syllable with heh) are natural in Hebrew, then there can be no argument about the naturalness of יַהְוֶה.

Background

I started studying biblical Hebrew in my second year of Bible college way back in 1999. So far, it’s been a twenty-seven-year dance with the language and what it presents to us. I’ve loved this language and the texts that have come down to us in it, both from the biblical period and from later periods of history. Almost anyone who sits through one of my live lessons will know that I’m excited about what we find in segolate constructions, in which consonant clusters undergo some type of resolution to create new syllables and to break up the cluster. This is something that I took interest in during that first year of study of BH (Biblical Hebrew) at Ozark Christian College (OCC) under Dr. Larry Pechawer, and every time I get to teach or talk about segolates in class sessions, I might go a bit overboard in my excitement to show just how prevalent this feature of the language’s morphology actually is. It appears everywhere and influences everything in the language. If understanding the use of participles is the key to mastering ancient Greek, then understanding the phenomenon of segolates is the key to unlocking comprehension of Hebrew morphology. I’m convinced of this.

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