11-13-2012, 03:39 AM
Paul Younan Wrote:Shlama Akhi Steve,
Please reference Psalm 2:1 and Acts 4:25 for an attestation of r-g-sh where "rage" is the meaning. The root in Hebrew OT and Aramaic NT is the same.
This is also supported by the Aramaic Targums (and Peshitta translation) of Psalms 2:1.
Shlama Akhi Paul. Long time no see. :-)
R-G-Sh appears in Targum Onqelos (predominantly an Eastern dialect) exclusively in Aphel as a minority reading.
In the Palestinian Targums (Western) it appears exclusively in Ethpe'el as "to perceive" or "to feel" (as in other Western dialects, which also use Aphel for the same meaning :: w-la argesh beh == "and he wasn't aware of him").
Paul Younan Wrote:"Ra'am" (thunder/tumult/trembling/roaring) is also a common Hebrew and Aramaic root (cf. Psalm 96:11, Isaiah 29:6, etc. (Hebrew, Aramaic Targums and Peshitta as primary texts))
Aye it was common in Hebrew and some Eastern Aramaic dialects (Syriac [where it is *very* strongly attested], Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, Mandaic [a few times], etc.), but it was not used in Western Aramaic dialects (Galilean, Samaritan, Christian Palestinian Aramaic, etc.) at all. It is simply absent from the corpus. What's more is that various words were used in Western dialects for "thunder," even when considerable exposure to other dialects happened. Christian Palestinian Aramaic, for example, despite all of the influence of Syriac, uses ra`ad exclusively.
All of this in mind, it would be even odder to hear a Galilean use the word ra'am to mean "thunder" or ragash as "rage" than it would be to hear an American from Texas say "boot" to refer to the trunk of their car. It simply doesn't really happen... but when it does, you know right off the bat that something is odd. :-)
Peace,
-Steve