The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions Quotes

“The contributory elements to the united Arab nationality were possibly the early Ishmaelites, Midianites, Amalekites and other kindred clans ... All constituent tribes were of the purest Semitic blood, and they were less affected by foreign influence than any other member of the Semitic family.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“multae terricolis linguae, coelestibus una”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“the Nabataeans were real Arabs .. there is substantial agreement of Biblical Aramaic with Nabataean, both in words and construction.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“In general it must be concluded that the accentuation of the Palestinian Aramaic (derived from Aramaic of Babylonia) was the same as the Biblical Aramaic, the Nabataean, the Syriac, and as understood by the first Targumists. The same has been assumed for the Talmudic Aramaic .. Yemen MSS of Onkelos constitute one of the best guides to the vocalization of this Targum .. The Palmyrenes were of Arab race, and consequently connected ethnically with the Nabataeans .. Familiar features of the language clearly show its kinship with Palestinian Aramaic.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“some differences between LXX and the MT. are more frequently to be attributed to defective writing, to ignorance on the part of the writers, to textual corruption, and even to laxity on the part of the translators .. for example, the fragments of the Hebrew text of Ecclesiastieus appear to belong to two different MSS. It is interesting to find in these MSS, dating perhaps circa x-xi cent., the abbreviation of the divine name by three marks.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The native language of Babylonia-Assyria did no doubt influence the language of Canaan, but chiefly through Phoenician script. The language found on Moabite Stone is practically identical with Old Testament Hebrew .. This fact supports the conclusion that the languages of the Phoenicians, Syrians, Moabites, Ammonites, Arabs and Babylonian-Assyrians, were almost identical in grammatical structures, and closely related in vocabulary in the centuries ix-viii B.C. All the Phoenician and Aramaic types of script may be traced back to this prototype on the Moabite Stone.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The 'square' character (of the Hebrew language) indeed seems to have arisen out of the Palmyrene script .. No doubt Aramaic was written in Babylonia before it was written in Canaan, and it was Aramaic influence which gradually changed the Phoenician cursive script into the uncial character.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Other divine names not peculiar to the Hebrew people is Shaddai.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Religion has been the larger contributor to nationality. It can be shown historically that kindred languages have not been sufficient to hold tribes together, but oneness of religion has held together peoples of variant tongues (see Max Müller, Science of Religion) .. It was their religion rather than their language which separated the Hebrews from the surrounding tribes.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The general conclusion .. many terms and ideas, which at one time were regarded as exclusively Biblical, are found to belong to the common stock of Semitic and eastern language and conception.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“That offerings were made by individuals to local deities is proved by an Egyptian Aramaean inscription.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“In the Egyptian papyri the 'Jews' are frequently called 'Aramaeans'.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Relatively the Canaanites were a cultured and active people, as Egyptian and other literary remains prove. From them the Israelites probably gained some knowledge of letters. The earliest forms of this Canaanite -Israelite language known to us are found in the Phoenician and Moabite inscriptions.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“It is found that Assyrian and Canaanite have certain terms in common, which are not found in other Semitic languages.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Jacob-el was a place-name in Palestine according to an inscription.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Hebrew was originally the name of some trans-Euphrates clans, and became general name for the confederate tribes after they crossed the Jordan. Abraham represented one of these clans.”
― John Courtenay James, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The Galilean Aramaic pronunciation of שׁ was שׂ, or rather ס as the Ephraimite or Samaritan.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Ammonite, a dialect akin to Hebrew and therefore similar to Moabite, which is an older form of Hebrew and one of the dialects of the 'language of Canaan.' Though these dialects were similar, the tribes were usually hostile.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“All the great Semitic migrations had their starting-place in Arabia.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The Semites originally moved out of Arabia.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“All Semitic languages are perhaps ultimately traceable to Arabia.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“It is most probable that the Israelitish period in Egypt came within the Hyksos Dynasty.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The books of the Old Testament, as we know them, do not represent the language of Palestine as spoken at any one time or in any one place.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Judaean Aramaic is in no sense a mixture of Hebrew and Syriac.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The Judaean dialect - This form of Palestinian Aramaic was akin to Nabataean and Palmyrene ... In its earliest form the language shows a striking affinity in grammar with Sabaean, a south Arabian dialect; in vocabulary it agrees remarkably with Phoenician and the older Hebrew.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Galilaean must not be regarded as a later and more degenerate form of Judaean, any more than Aramaic itself must be regarded as a corrupt form of Hebrew.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“... was considered corrupt and barbarous. The cultivated sense of the metropolitan Jew was often offended by the rough and ready speech of the Galilaean.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“When out of their native province, the Galilaeans sometimes so blended or divided words as to render them unintelligible.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“Samaritan Targum ... maybe compared with the Aramaic of the Jerusalem Talmud and with the Palestinian Syriac. On the whole it was more akin to Galilaean than to Judaean, but was closer to Hebrew than either.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions

“The Palestinian Aramaic in general is not to be distinguished from the Aramaic portions of Daniel, Ezra and the Targums in their original form. The Nabataean and Palmyrene inscriptions are found in a language practically the same.”
― James John Courtenay, The Language of Palestine and Adjacent Regions