Talk:Samaritan Hebrew

to the person below

please,samaritan hebrew is even more reduced than ashkenazi hebrew,lacking even more gutterals also you seem to thing that samaritan script and ancient hebrew(paleo Hebrew) are the same, your wrong Samaritan has changed just as much since even the Aramaic alphabet used from hebrew evolved from paleohebrew which also used to write aramaic,samaritan script is different. http://www.omniglot.com/images/writing/aramaic.gif vs http://www.omniglot.com/images/writing/samaritan.gif

Impression

Samaritan language is original ancient Hebrew! You give another impression in this article. Strange! Should nobody know that actual Hebrew Bible is not a original version?! Should we let the people of the world believe that this rabbinic version (arranged with babilonian's letters by Esra) is the right version? No. You are obliged to make clearely that the actual Hebrew version of Torah (+Tenach) is a traduction version (from Aramenian). Nobody has right to teach the lies! unsigned comment by anon user 84.226.114.95

number one calm down, the main the changed was the script not the language. It not original Hebrew, for Waw evoled into Baa, 'Adeni Yememenite Hebrew is much closer in the area of pronunication. It preserves interesting elements for example the names of letters a slighty different.

Wow, where to begin. How bout if I just say that there is not a shred of evidence for what you are saying. The fact that Aramaic language usages occur in the Tanakh is no evidence that it was translated from Aramaic. Aramaic was the lingua franca in the Levant as early as the 800s BCE. In fact both the Hebrew language that developed among Jews and Samaritan Hebrew were living languages that developed over centuries, and both incorporated Aramaic and other usages from cultures with whom they had contact. --Briangotts (talk) 18:18, 17 August 2005 (UTC) That's right no supporting evidence of samaritan more accurate, it's very close to the hebrew text anyway. about 6,000 minor differences (subtle changes of word ordering or phrasing) between the Samaritan and the Hebrew texts, by far the majority are unimportant. One variation of interest appears at Exodus 12:40, where the Samaritan Pentateuch corresponds to the Septuagint. However, some are major, as, for example, the reading of Deuteronomy 27:4, where Gerizim is substituted for Ebal, the place where the laws of Moses were to be inscribed on whitewashed stones. (De 27:8) The obvious reason for this change was to give credence to their belief that Gerizim is the holy mountain of God.

In any case, the article suddenly switches in midstream. The descriptive part relates to Samaritan Hebrew, as used in the Samaritan text of the Torah. This is basically similar to Biblical Hebrew, apart from script and pronunciation. A Samaritan would indeed say that this is the original Hebrew.

On the other hand, the sample given is Samaritan Aramaic, sometimes called just "Samaritan", which is an entirely different language, used for the Samaritan translation of the Torah (equivalent to the Jewish Targums) and in their religious texts equivalent to rabbinic literature. This, as the article says, is fairly similar to the Aramaic of Targum Onkelos. No one ever claimed that Samaritan Aramaic is the original language of the scriptures. The part with the sample should therefore be hived off into a separate article on Samaritan Aramaic, and another sample found to illustrate the actual Samaritan Pentateuch. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 16:01, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Now done! (except for finding the sample) --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 16:47, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Grammar

Surely the grammar section should be renamed "parts of speech"? It in no way addresses the grammatical rules of the language. Ataru 01:54, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Agreed.

Jewish language?

I don't think it's accurate to call Samaritan Hebrew a Jewish language. In fact, since there is SAMARITAN Hebrew, I don't think it's accurate to call Hebrew as a whole a Jewish language. I think it would probably be more accurate to say that most DIALECTS of Hebrew are Jewish. Gringo300 05:00, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Strictly that is right: Jews and Samaritans are two branches of the Israelite people and religion. However, to have a category "Israelite languages" would be very awkward, and linguistically the two Samaritan languages are very close to the strictly Jewish ones; though not Jewish languages, they are languages of Jewish interest. To cut them out of the category would mean that they were not linked to from anywhere (or else drowned in a sea of Semitic languages including Arabic, Ethiopic, Assyrian and all the rest). So I would recommend leaving things as they are for the sake of accessibility, even if it is not quite accurate. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 09:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

It looks to me like a more accurate term would be "Israelitic languages" rather than "Israelite languages". From what I understand, "Israelite" is a noun, and the adjective "Israelitic" would mean "of or having to do with Israelites". Gringo300 13:37, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Also, it looks to me like Samaritan Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic would more accurately be called "Samaritan DIALECTS" rather than "Samaritan LANGUAGES". As in Hebrew and Aramaic are LANGUAGES, but Samaritan Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic are DIALECTS. Gringo300 13:40, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Jewish Hebrew and Samaritan Hebrew

Since there is Samaritan Hebrew, it appears to me that it would be accurate to say that there is such thing as Jewish Hebrew. Any opinions and/or comments from anyone else? Gringo300 14:59, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Jews can mean Judean.--72.38.211.144 (talk) 03:15, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

We must compare the Judean Hebrew with the Samaritan. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.38.211.144 (talk) 19:35, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

- ’Ā´lāph. ' /ʔ/

- Bîhth. /b/

- Gā´mān. /ɡ/

- Dā´lath. /d/

- Iē’. /ey/,

- Báā. /b/

- Zēn. /z/

- Īhth.

- Tihth. /tˁ/

- Yūhth. /y/

- Káph. /k/

- Lā´bāth. /l/

- Mīīm. /m/

- Nūn. /n/

- Sîn´gath/Sîn´kath. /s/

- ‛A´yîn. /ʕ/

- Phī’. /f/

- Tsa•dhey´. /tzsˁ/ /tş/

- Qūhph. /qˁ/

- Rīhšh. /ɾ/

- šhān. /š/ (sh)

- Táph./t/

--72.38.211.144 (talk) 23:01, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

It seems that the vowels o, u are a bit stronger, longer, and more round. Also, the Samaritan speech seems to come from the depth of ones throat.

They would say Quoting one reference source the escaping Ephraimites, during their conflict with Jephthah, gave themselves away to the Gileadite sentries at the fords of the Jordan by mispronouncing the initial “sh” sound of this password...saying “Sibboleth.” (Judges 12:4-6) Thus, it is evident that some variation of pronunciation existed among the tribes, even as in later times the Galileans had a manner of speech distinct from the Judeans.—Compare Matthew 26:73; Luke 22:59.” —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.38.144.241 (talk) 03:18, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The most comprehensive material concerning Samaritan Hebrew is Ze'ev Ben-Hayyim's five-volume "Literary and Oral Tradition of Hebrew and Aramaic According to the Samaritans (LOTS). The fifth volume is a grammar that has been translated into English. The volumes are in Modern Hebrew. Rudolf Macuch has published a German grammar of Samaritan Hebrew. There is not much else out there. It is quite different than the Jewish Massoretic Tradition, as is obvious when listening to the Shma. --24.57.60.200 (talk) 04:16, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

This is Shma Yisrael, the samaritan says "u-kashartem l-ut al-yedek, w-ayu l-tatafot bin eenek, u-katabtem al-mazoozot betek ub-sharek".

Samaritan: u-qashartem l-ut al-yedek, b-ayu l-tataphoht bin eenek, u-katabtem al-mazoozot betek ub-sharek

Judean: u-qashartim lauth ohl-yedek, w-ayu l-tataphoht bin eenek, u-katabtem al-mezuzoth′ bithek ub-shorik.