A unique study of the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls In Qumran Hebrew, Reymond examines the orthography, phonology, and morphology of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Short sections treat specific linguistic phenomena and present a synopsis and critique of previous research. Reymond's approach emphasizes problems posed by scribal errors and argues that guttural letters had not all "weakened" but instead were "weak" in specific linguistic environments, texts, or dialects. Reymond illustrates that certain phonetic shifts (such as the shift of yodh > aleph and the opposite shift of aleph > yodh) occur in discernible linguistic contexts that suggest this was a real phonetic phenomenon.

Product Description: This volume explores the language and poetic structure of the seven non-Masoretic poems preserved in the Dead Sea Scroll labeled 11Q5 or 11QPsa. It presents fresh readings of the Hebrew poems, which were last studied intensively almost fifty years ago, stressing their structural and conceptual coherence and incorporating insights gained from the scholarship of recent decades...read more

Although scholars point to similarities between Sirach and the book of Proverbs and sometimes characterize Ben Sira's relationship to biblical poetry as one of imitation (often unsuccessful imitation), this study considers the innovative and unique aspects of Sirach poetry, especially its use of parallelism, and demonstrates that Ben Sira does not rely exclusively on Proverbs or any other biblical book as a model. Innovations in Hebrew Poetry provides detailed readings and philological analysis for the nine poems in the Masada scroll, and general observations on many other Sirach and biblical poems complement the analysis.