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Someone wrote: "It's better for the understanding of Biblical Hebrew to separate it from the late religions of Judaism and Christianity. Biblical Hebrew is the Phoenician language not some divine God language that fell out the sky." That is a very odd claim. Hebrew is the language of the Jewish people -- and always has been. There has never been a generation without it, ergo the idea that somehow it "changed" thanks to "the late religion of Judaism" makes zero sense. Ivri (“Hebrew script”) is called Phoenician or Paleo-Hebrew. The ancient Hebrew alphabet, known as the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, was replaced by the square Aramaic alphabet, It seems that whoever wrote your quote is unfamiliar with the fact that this word is used to speak of the ancient script (and not the Phoenician people) let alone that it is not a different aleph-bet that "the late religion of Judaism" changed. This year in 2022 a small lead tablet was discovered that was engraved with early proto-alphabetic Hebrew found at Mt. Ebal, dated to the 15th century BCE (picture in top left corner). The earliest Phoenician inscription that has survived is the Ahiram epitaph at Byblos in Phoenicia, dating from the 11th century BCE…400-years later than the Mt. Ebal Hebrew inscription. So the oldest Hebrew engraving is hundreds of years older than the oldest Phoenician inscription.
"Inscribed on a tablet of Aegean lead, the curse in proto-Canaanite script was a legal document…" Haaretz. Written in Proto-Canaanite not Phoenician script. Ancient Hebrew. 15th century BCE. Prior to this discovery the earliest known ancient witness in Hebrew was the Khirbet Qeiyafa Inscription (11th–10th century BCE). This image is shown at the bottom of the post. It does not use the Phoenician script either thereby proving that the person you are referencing is incorrect. Hebrew did not spring from the Phoenician language – and probably not from its alphabet either… "University of Haifa Professor Gershon Galil announces that he has deciphered an inscription from the time of King David’s reign in the 10th century BCE. The inscription, written in an ancient proto-Canaanite script, is the earliest known Hebrew writing discovered to date. "The text as deciphered by Galil, tells its readers to protect slaves, widows and orphans; rehabilitate the poor and support strangers. The discovery according to Galil, “indicates that the Kingdom of Israel already existed in the 10th century BCE and that at least some of the biblical texts were written hundreds of years before the dates presented in current research.” "The discovery was especially noteworthy because it provides evidence that parts of the Hebrew Bible were composed hundreds of years before the dates proposed by many researchers up to that point." Israel ED. Written in Proto-Canaanite not Phoenician script. Ancient Hebrew. "This new inscription marks a transitional stage between the writing system used for 800 years and the official, standardized Phoenician script used by kingdoms and states in Canaan by at least the 10th century BCE,” the authors of the study wrote." Times of Israel. So both early Hebrew inscriptions did not use the Phoenician alphabet. Instead the alphabet used was proto-Canaanite but the language was Hebrew. And the first is about 400 years older than any known Phoenician alphabet. Read on… "Prof. Galil's deciphering of the ancient writing testifies to its being Hebrew, based on the use of verbs particular to the Hebrew language, and content specific to Hebrew culture and not adopted by any other cultures in the region." Science Daily. Now let's move away from ancient Hebrew and discuss ancient Phoenician… The earliest Phoenician inscription that has survived is the Ahiram epitaph at Byblos in Phoenicia, dating from the 11th century BCE. Hebrew was not based on the Phoenician language. The Phoenician alphabet was adopted has the script or font for written Hebrew at one point. Later it was abandoned for a script based on Aramaic. Script. Letter formation. But the language was still Hebrew, not Phoenician or any other language.… As I have already explained there are some who think that the letter formation in the Phoenician alphabet was used as a type of script or font for Hebrew (Ktav Ivri). Ktav Ashuri (a Hebrew font) uses Aramaic letter formations – and there was even a time in history when Greek letters were used to write Hebrew! Yes, not a Greek translation but Hebrew using the Greek alphabet! There are those who think the Phoenicians may actually have adopted the Hebrew aleph-bet, not the reverse. It seems more likely the Phoenician alphabet came from the proto Canaanite alphabet. The recent archeological discovery in Israel that I referenced in this post indicates that an early form of Hebrew is far older than many thought and it did not use the Phoenician alphabet. "Prof. Galil also notes that the inscription was discovered in a provincial town in Judea. "He explains that if there were scribes in the periphery, it can be assumed that those inhabiting the central region and Jerusalem were even more proficient writers. "It can now be maintained that it was highly reasonable that during the 10th century BCE, during the reign of King David, there were scribes in Israel who were able to write literary texts and complex historiographies such as the books of Judges and Samuel." "He adds that the complexity of the text discovered in Khirbet Qeiyafa, along with the impressive fortifications revealed at the site, refute the claims denying the existence of the Kingdom of Israel at that time." Press Release. To summarize, this ancient witness was found in a backwater provincial town. Obviously major cities including Jerusalem would have had written Hebrew as well. In other words: if a backward town was using Hebrew writing it wasn’t as rare as one might think. Both the 15th century and 11th or 10th century BCE ancient Hebrew was using proto-Canaanite script for the Hebrew language (not Canaanite or Phoenician). The 15th century BCE inscription is at least 400 years older than the oldest Phoenician inscription currently known.
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