a. The Talmudic explanations of the Biblical passage Neh. viii, S, where, as a means of iinilei>taMdin>; the sense of the law read hi pubhc, D"^?3S"l3 and '^pID'^S 0*^73 Jt3 are adduced, besides the verse-division D'^p"D2.
b. D'^^"I3 ""piOS and min ■'^aS'lJ are also men- tioned.
Such expressions have been thought to allude not mere- ly to divisions of the sense and accents, but also to vowel-signs. But D'^^"12 does not mean accents, such as we now have in the text. It denotes sententia, a logical sentence, and l3 '^plO'^S incisa sententiarum, divisions of the sense, or short passages.
The Talmud, therefore, does not contain even the in- cipient features of a written vowel svstem. All the ex- pressions which have been referred to such need oidy to be rightly explained, and they will be found to in- volve the absence of vowel-points and accents.
2. From the writings of Jerome, we also see that he was unacquainted with the present vowel-signs, the ac- cents, and the diacritic points of the letters. He never mentions them ; and wiierever he has occasion to de- scribe words, his descriptions refer to the consonants alone. His usual expressions, accordingly, are scribititr and scriptiim, legitur and Icctum — the former two refer- ring to the letters, tiie latter two to their pronuncia- tion— and the contrast implied indicating that while the consonants were written, the vowels were supplied by traditional usage. This is confirmed by the fact of his remarking in various places that the same word or the same letters (idem verbum, or sej'nio iisdem lilteris scriptus) might be read {lefji) — that is, pronounced, and conseqnentlv understood (inielliejt) — in various ways, ac- cording to the connection (pro qualilute loci or locorum, pro conseqventia , prvut locus et ordoflarjitaverinf), or ac- cording to the judgment of the reader (pro arbitrio kyentis, voluntute lectorum) or the vernacular of the country (p)o varietate regionnni) ; and, on the contrary, two words (utrumque verbum) as to signification were written with the same letters. Words of this sort he calls ambiffita. To such ambiguity (anibirpiitas ser- monis) he ascribes the numerous deviations and mis- takes of the ancient translators, particularly the Sept., whom he blames only where their version does violence to the letters, or interchanges words whose letters have no similarity to one another. In giving his own ver- sion from the Hebrew, he appears sometimes undecided which is the right reading, and gives the deviations of former translators without making known his own judg- ment (comp. Epist. 126, ad Evagr.). Occasionally he indicates his opinion by melius or nuigis, as if one read- ing were more ]irobable than another because better suited to the connection (see Mic. v, 3; Zeph. iii, 8; Hab. iii, 4; Gen. xxvi., 12). Such cases, however, an; the exceptions, for he is usually decided; and where he does give the grounds of his decision, he rests on these sources :
a. He is often guided by the connection alone.
b. Tlie authority of his predecessors, particularly Sym- machns and Theodolion, peihaps the majority of tliem in opposition to the Sept., determines him (see Amos iii, 11; iv, 12,13; Mic. V, 3, 7,1-2).
c. Above all, the authority of the Jewish rabbins by whom he was instructed guided his Inmslations. By this he was chiefly influenced, seklom departing: from its voice. "HebiiEiis qui me docidt assercbat," and like ex- pressions, we meet with in his expositions, vvliich is but natural, considering the circumstances in which he was placed. Stress has been laid n|)on the fMCt that Jerome sometimes employs arcentus, which erroneously has been taken in the sense of a sign for regulating the readiusr. But the acrt'ntus of the Latins, like the Trpoawbia of the Greeks, relers to the vocalization and the varying shades of am1)igiious consonant sounds, but not to written signs. Jerome speaks of diuemis sonis et aceentibiis prnferuntur (com)). Ad Evagr. 125), while the expression pro varietate, ncee.iitimtn is used in the same way, and of the same wolds, as the phrase juzta ambUjuitatein aermonis si legatur, etc.
d. There is another class of passages in which he speaks with express reference to the oriijinnl text (in Hehneo scrijHuin, est or habetitr, in Ilelra'o iiiulto aliter leijitur,
VOWEL-POINTS
820
VOWEL-POINTS
jttxta Hebraicwm vertimvs, jnxta Hebr. veritatem, etc.), jiiid rt-jecls a reading adopted by former tiaiislators. Here he merely expres^es his conviction tlial his own reading and interpretation are right. And there jire places wluTo he thus refers to the original and, with all his knowledge, makes mistakes whicli could only have occurred in tiie ab>euce ofall written vowel-marks. Thus,
C"j and C'w, VZ':^! and "2b, D-'l^'d and Diirb con- vey to him one and the same meaning (comp. llupfeld, Kritixclie lielcuchtuncj einiger dtmkelii mid minnverstcuuie- neii l^telleii, etc.. in tlie IStdd. u. Krit. 1S30, p. 573, etc.).
From what lias been said, it is evident that Jerome knew no vowel-points, any more than tlie Tahnud, and that the Sept. translators did not use a vocalized text.
3. Fiist Tract's. — The Hebrew vocalization was, no doubt, suggested by the example of the Arai)ian, or more probably tlie Syrian, writing; but though it is analogous to that of the kindred languages, it is con- siderably richer and more elaborate. When the He- brew vocalization was introduced has long been a mat- ter of uncertainty and dispute. According to a state- inent on a scroll of the law, which may have been in Susa from the 8lh century, IMoses the Fmictuator was the (irst who. in order to facilitate the reading of the Scriptures for his pupils, added vowels to the consonants, a practice in which he was followed b_v his son Jndah the Corrector, or Keviser. These were the beginnings of a full system of Hebrew points, the completion of which has by tradition been associated with the name of the Karaite Acha. or Acliai of Irak, living about 550, and which comprised the vowels and accents, dacjesh and rap/ieli, Keri and Kethib. It was, from its local origin, called the Babylonian or Assyrian system ClipS ib::nn, in'rx n"p;), or the Eastern system. The peculiarity of this .system con.sists in having signs of a different shape to represent the vowels: Xhus.kamets is ^ ; pathach, -\ ner/nl, ; chirek, or , and if a ^ follows, merely a dot above it; cholem, ; kibbufs. ; sheva is , and is employed at the end of words also, even above n qniescens; only tsere, shiirek, and dayesh are like those in use at present in our Hebrew texts. Another peculiarity of this system is that the vowels are almost uniformly placed above the letters. It is therefore desig- nated tha snperliiieari/ nys/em (Jlb"^b TplD'C). Thus. e. g., Isa. xlix, 18 is, according to the old Babylonian vocalization, represented: d'?S "^X"!^ T'^J^i" i'l^D "^Xw ~3 'S- ^liSp;. This system is best exhibited in the I'fopheiarum Posterioi-uni Codex Babylonicus Pelropoli- laniis (ed. Strack, Petropoli, 1876), p. 450 sq.