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Re: Josephus & DSS
>>>My Hebrew still has a long way to go, but I think (?) that Ya'akov
was called "ha-Tzadiyk," not "ha-Tzeddek"? The former connotes the filling
of a relationship or b'riyt. I'm not aware of any implication in the title
peculiar to the Therapeutae.<<
Judith:
<Actually, that's 50% correct. the adjective is indeed ha-tzaddiq (tzedeq
is a noun!) but the bearer of that title is not Jacob but Joseph.>
Yirmiyahu:
Since the Hebrew grammar turned out as I thought, it's 100%.<
I apologize for the confusion. For some reason I thought you were commenting
on the name of the BIBLICAL Jacob, and had confused his description with that
of the BIBLICAL Joseph. (I obviously wasn't paying sufficient attention to
your context.) So I withdraw that comment and substitute a different comment,
as follows, which answers the point you were in fact trying to make:
Nobody would be called so-and-so hatsedeq; you're correct on that score. But
a person can be called so and so, the something-of tsedeq In the expression
moreh hatzeddeq, moreh is construct (smikhut), the vowel represented by the
"e" being not tsere but segol. Hence, literally, "teacher-of" righteousness,
obviously requiring the noun tsedeq and not the adjective tsaddiq. It is
true that this is a Hebrew idiom which semantically signifies "righteous
teacher" -- but that is a matter of idiom, and does not magically turn the
noun tsedeq into the adjective tsaddiq!
As for the relative merits of transliteration versus what you call
"phonemicizing", I don't see the value of the latter on a list like Orion where
people must by definition have enough Hebrew to engage in the work, and thus
are not in the category of ill-informed laypersons whom you appear to have in
mind. In particular, they must have enough knowledge of Hebrew grammar to
be able to consider variant readings of DSS texts. I don't see how anyone
lacking that level of grammatical knowledge, plus the necessary level of
vocabulary to distinguish roots from grammatical prefixes and suffixes, can
even engage in the discussion!
So I don't think you need to worry about it at the level you discussed.
Judith Romney Wegner
Connecticut College.