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The World's Oldest Alphabet: Hebrew As the Language of the Proto-consonantal Script Hardcover – April 7, 2017

by Douglas Petrovich (Author)

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For close to 150 years, scholars have attempted to identify the language of the world's oldest alphabetic script and to translate the inscriptions that use it, which were found in the Sinai Peninsula and date from 1842 to 1446 BCE. Until now, scholars have accomplished little more than identifying most of the pictographic letters and translating a few of the Semitic words. In The World's Oldest Alphabet, however, Douglas Petrovich presents a thorough, detailed defense of his bold new claims concerning these writings. Petrovich claims to have resolved all of the disputed letters and to have identified the language as Hebrew, which allows him to translate all of the inscriptions. Furthermore, he argues that they explicitly name three biblical figures and greatly illuminate the earliest Israelite history in a way that nothing else has, apart from the Bible.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"The breakthrough as to the question of the origins of the alphabet represented in this volume is the fruit of the author's intensive and extensive research and fastidious attention to detail. His acclaimed expertise in epigraphy, paleography, lexicography, and comparative linguistics and literature has led him to the conviction that of all options one can currently advance as to the ultimate origins of the alphabet, the identification of proto-Hebrew is the very best candidate."
--Eugene H. Merrill, Distinguished Professor of Old Testament Studies (Emeritus), Dallas Theological Seminary

About the Author

Douglas Petrovich (Ph.D., M.A., Th.M., M.Div.) teaches on Ancient Egypt at Wilfrid Laurier University (Canada). He formerly was the academic dean and a professor at Novosibirsk Biblical-Theological Seminary (Russia), as well as at Shepherds Theological Seminary (U.S.A.). He earned a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto, with a major in Syro-Palestinian Archaeology, a first minor in ancient Egyptian language, and a second minor in ancient Near Eastern religions.

Product details

Publisher : Carta Jerusalem (April 7, 2017)
Language : English
Hardcover : 280 pages
ISBN-10 : 9652208841
ISBN-13 : 978-9652208842
Item Weight : 1.9 pounds
Dimensions : 6.75 x 1 x 9.75 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,752,281 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #4,120 in Archaeology (Books)
- #11,926 in Ancient Civilizations
- #393,930 in Religion & Spirituality (Books)

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Rick j. Vair, Ph.D.

With some weaknesses, an interesting and possibly valid hypothesis.

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2019

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One of the reasons I bought and read this book was because of the review given by “Thutmosis” in contrast to some of the other reviews.

Since my background In Near Eastern Studies includes a Ph.D. from a joint program of the Graduate Theological Union and the University of California, Berkeley in the 1970s, I was curious why the reviews were so different. This also because some of the observations of “Thutmosis” seemed to be sound in regard to the need to examine the writing in person and not depend on image, however enlarged ( shadows and apparent markings are sometimes quite different or non existent in the actual encounter with the written sample as Carsten Peter Thiede and others have pointed out).

However, given the validity of a number of those criticisms by “Thutmosis”, I think that Douglas Petrovich makes a compelling case overall. Perhaps a second edition could address some or most of the criticisms that seek references for clarification and better methodology in the analysis of certain arguments or considerations. But the overall discussion seems to suggest that Petrovich’s thesis may well have support from the data and the reasoning that he has put forward.

I would highly recommend the book for the very reason that the approach is fresh (for there has been some previous research that was in this direction) and at least argues reasonably well that opposing views may be looking in the wrong places with misinformed presumptions.

16 people found this helpful

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Don

Whole book is awesome!!

Reviewed in the United States on January 10, 2018

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5 STAR book, tremendous read and research!! Whole book is awesome!!

9 people found this helpful

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Lewis T. Turner

Excellent Resource

Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2017

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This book appears to be an accumulation of a lifetime of work by Dr. Petrovich. He is careful, methodical, and scholarly in his work. For me, it is not a fast read--but one to be digested. He has done an excellent job in sharing his research in this book. I appreciate Him documenting his research, which helps me in my research of studying the meanings of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet--which I have been working on for 5 years. He has provided some recent understanding of Hebrew and the Alphabet letters (including their meaning) based on Archeological finds.

I highly recommend this book to those who are interested in the study of Hebrew.

21 people found this helpful

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Thutmosis

Cannot recommend this book

Reviewed in the United States on February 14, 2019

The premise of The World's Oldest Alphabet by Douglas Petrovich is that Hebrew is the language that underlies the early alphabetic inscriptions that were found in Egypt, which the author calls proto-consonantal inscriptions (7). And while not stated until the end of the book, by showing that Hebrew underlies these early inscriptions, the author seeks to prove that the exodus took place in 1446 BC (195).

Chapter 1 (14 pages) sets out to discuss “background matters” to the early alphabetic inscriptions. In this section, Petrovich explains how he arrived at the view that “the world’s oldest alphabet, is Hebrew” (10). He starts with the assumption that the exodus occurred as a historical event in 1446 BC and asserts that Joseph's son Manasseh was Ḫebedeb, one of the “Hebrews” that wrote the Serâbîṭ el Khadîm inscriptions. He states that “the goal of the present work is to demonstrate that Hebrew is the language behind the original proto-consonantal script, and to translate 16 inscriptions from the Bronze Age that validate this claim as true” (11).

Chapter 2 (61 pages) contains translations of Middle Kingdom texts Sinai 115, 376, and 377, Wadi el-Hôl 1 and 2, and the Lahun Bilingual Ostracon. Chapter 3 (111 pages) has translations of New Kingdom texts Sinai 345a/b, 346a/b, 349, 351, 353, 357, 360, 361, 375a, and 378. This is a surprisingly small data set for a book of this nature. And when one considers the amount of cognate material available, perhaps more surprising is that no early alphabetic inscription from the Levant is referenced that might have supported his argument.

Petrovich steps through each text with a “background to the inscription,” “paleographic decipherment,” “translation and orthography,” and “potential historical value”. Petrovich’s contribution is to review the epigraphy of previous scholars and supply his own readings. The bulk of the book involves the thought process of deciphering the alphabetic letters for each inscription. The decipherment of each letter is compared to how other epigraphers have read the letters, often disagreeing with more mainstream scholars.

Deviations from standard Hebrew present an obstacle for a thesis trying to prove Hebrew as the underlying language of these texts. It would have helped the reader if the author had explained—or at least recognized—these idiosyncratic features of early Hebrew and relate them to other known Semitic examples.

Furthermore, the epigraphy is curious. With Sinai 115, the author muddles the Egyptian p with the early orthography of the letter bet to read ἰbr (19). He implies that this orthography equals ʿibrî, “Hebrew” (23). While this might seem esoteric, this epigraphic argument is one of the central pillars of the case presented by this book (191). However, this reading is strange given that the Egyptian ἰ is not equivalent to the Hebrew ayin.

Petrovich’s argument that the channel cut style of the glyph means that this letter cannot be an Egyptian p (19) is special pleading. Numerous examples of a channel cut Egyptian p exist, including from within the formal Egyptian text in the upper portion of Sinai 115 itself. Besides, context alone makes this reading implausible because the so-called Semitic letter occurs inside a text of otherwise uncontested Egyptian letters, making the Egyptian p more plausible.

The author further claims that the Egyptian gb-ἰtw in Sinai 115 really means “Bethel.” He justifies this claim with a “historical” explanation instead of a linguistic explanation. Since God wrestled Jacob “on the ground” (27), Ḫebedeb would have associated the God of Jacob with the Egyptian earth-god Geb. Therefore, “'the house of (the) God (of / on the earth)' (=Bethel)” (28).

For Sinai 357, he reads the seventh horizontal letter as an ox-head alef. Petrovich states that “The antlers consist more of jagged lines than of a continuous curve” (144) but has not seemed to grasp that oxen have horns not antlers. This error is made consistently through the book (32, 49, 67, 82, 102, 107, 109, 110, 128, 132, 134, 146, 148, 155, 177, 183, 190). He defers to previous epigraphers to justify this reading even though the Sinai 357 letter is actually two letters, nun and kaf, written close together.

Sinai 375a (HSM 1935.4.7) is read as a dual Egyptian/Hebrew inscription, “The overseer of minerals, Ahisamach. The one having been elevated is weary to forget” (175). Besides a translation that makes little sense, the reading infers an Egyptian y that the epigraphy cannot support after a Hebrew khet in “Ahisamach” and ignores a string of characters (ayin, lamed, zayin) that follow immediately after the supposed yod, traces of which have been noted by other epigraphers and which can be easily seen under strobe examination of the stela.

The translation of the Egyptian portion of Sinai 375a is doubtful. Petrovich reads Gardiner Sign M42 as an abbreviation for ἰmyw, “minerals” citing Vygus’ online self-published word list as his source without reference to the exact entry or page number (174). However, no word ἰmyw meaning “minerals” is in Vygus or any other standard Egyptian dictionary. Petrovich provides no evidence that Sign M42 was ever used as an abbreviation for “minerals” (179).

Although the epigraphy is a problem, Petrovich’s dating is more so as it relies upon circular reasoning by assuming the conclusions he’s trying to prove. He starts with the premise that the name Ahisamach only appears in the book of Exodus (181). Then he begs the question leaping from “if the Ahisamach of Sinai 375a is the same man as the lone biblical personage of that name” (182) to “The significance of Sinai 375a to the present study cannot be underestimated… due to its identification of an obscure biblical character [Ahisamach] of this latter date in an historical context” (182).

Not content to stop there, he assumes an early exodus view, dates the stela according to that assumption, then claims the date of the stela as proof for an early exodus. According to Petrovich, the Exodus dates to 1446 BC. So, he claims that Sinai 375a must date to about 30 years earlier to ca. 1480 BC (182). Then, he concludes that the dating of the early alphabetic inscriptions “is the refutation of errant views of Biblical chronology, such as the late exodus view” (195).

Chapter 4 (15 pages) are the “concluding thoughts” where Petrovich states that the early alphabetic inscriptions “can be equated with Hebrew confidently” for three reasons: (1) The presence of the noun “Hebrews” in Sinai 115. (2) Each early alphabetic letter has a Middle Egyptian “hieroglyphic exemplar.” (3) The presence of “Three biblical figures who have names used of only one person in the Bible” (191).

However, these reasons seem unrelated to the central thesis that Hebrew is the language that underlies the early alphabetic inscriptions. And no attempt is made to deduce a conclusion from linguistic arguments. Instead of discussing the overarching nature of the inscriptions and the Hebrew within them, the author shifts his argument to using the supposed presence of Hebrew as proof that the exodus took place in 1446 BC and as support for the historical events that took place in the books of Exodus and Genesis (186-187, 195-199).

Even though much of the final chapter is devoted to the early dating of the exodus, a sizeable portion is also devoted to irrelevant issues, e.g., the gender of the golden calf (199-200). Why only those with his specialized education have “the ability to contribute to the topic in any truly significant manner” (188). And why his methodology is beyond questioning, “even if someone were to receive the appropriate training… archaeologists and ANE scholars would then turn around and accuse that researcher of applying improper methodology” (188). However, this defensive posture draws attention to Petrovich’s methodology.

Petrovich used publication photos magnified to 400% in Microsoft PowerPoint (xii, 86), a method no modern epigrapher would recognize. The author did not use specialized (multiple light or multispectral) photography and strobe lighting. Advanced imaging software, like DStretch or Photoshop, was not used. The best recent photographs and polynomial texture maps were not used. The author did not examine most of these inscriptions in person nor did he use the most recent epigraphic tools. This has led to epigraphy that is inferior to Hamilton's readings of a decade ago.

In addition Petrovich cites himself 39 times, which shows inadequate interaction with prior scholarship. Some citations refer to ideas that other authors said long ago; e.g., “the exodus pharaoh (Exod 5:1) is Amenhotep II (Petrovich 2006)” (197) when that same idea was claimed by James Orr and J. W. Jack. If the author had cited Orr and Jack’s identification of Amenhotep II in the 2006 article, then these citations may have only been weak scholarship. Neither this book nor the 2006 article cite Orr or Jack.

Some of the self-citations conceal the original source (28, 74, 152, 195); e.g., compare “which totaled 101,128 (Petrovich 2006: 102, 104-106)” (28) with “The figures given totaled 101,128” taken from ANET. Petrovich cited original sources in an article then cited his own article with no reference to the original sources. Source materials with easily available citations were handled in a sloppy manner.

18 self-citations are to an unpublished, unfinished work. This is regrettable. Given the bold claims of the book, having so many citations dependent upon a work that may not come to fruition is deeply unsatisfying. Some of these come at critical junctures in the book when evidence would have been really useful.

For example, “Asenath was the wife of Joseph and the mother of Ephraim and Manassah, the two sons who departed from their father’s house when their grandfather (Jacob) informed Joseph that he was confiscating them and taking them to live among their uncles as their equals (Gen 48:5, 15-20), which can be demonstrated archaeologically (Petrovich: in prep).” (70) If it can be “demonstrated archaeologically,” surely an adequate citation must exist. Wouldn’t that evidence be germane to his central argument?

Ultimately, Petrovich never supplies proof that his translations are from Hebrew as opposed to any other Semitic language. Nor does he compare the early alphabetic inscriptions with earlier Semitic languages like Akkadian. This is baffling given that Eugene Merrill, who wrote the preface, lauded him for “His acclaimed expertise in … comparative linguistics and literature” (vi).

Even though pastors and teachers may consider purchasing the book, these audiences might find the content unsuitable. The writing style employs dense prose and makes comparisons only specialists with experience in epigraphy might comprehend. The level of detail could overwhelm the non-specialist while the lack of evidence would likely disappoint those expecting a quality academic work. All things considered, the best thing about this book is that the publisher, CARTA Jerusalem, brought its experience as a mapmaker to create a volume with beautiful typography and flawlessly printed graphics.

After thoroughly reading The World's Oldest Alphabet, I cannot recommend this book. This work is deeply flawed with many examples of confirmation bias, logical fallacy, and failure to engage the existing scholarship. The translations are based upon an inadequate methodology, a doubtful epigraphy, and a poor understanding of ancient languages. The evidence that the book presents is insufficient to warrant the hyperbolic claims. And the tone of the writing does not seek to convince as much as forcefully assert its conclusions. The problems with the book are plentiful, easy to discover, and the work does not advance existing scholarship.

20 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Martin Johnson

The evidence for Hebrew use in Ancient Egypt

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 29, 2017

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This is a most important book in the field of Biblical studies, and consequently has attracted a lot of controversy. What Douglas Petrovich has accomplished is to demonstrate in a most compelling way that a selection of texts found during the past century or so in Ancient Egyptian sites are actually written in Hebrew. This is a breakthrough on the level of the Rosetta Stone, the decipherment of Cretan Linear B, or the Mayan Codex - which were all carvings or texts that defied decipherment until someone worked out the original languages in use.
The book is written in a very academic style, and packed with detail, including discussions of the differing opinions on every one of the 300 or so glyphs or letters that are in question, across a total of 16 inscriptions. One text is written in Middle Egyptian (identifying the presence of Hebrew people, and possibly referring to Bethel). The other 15 contain "Proto-Consonantal" script, which Petrovich and others argue has been derived from Egyptian hieroglyphics. If so, this becomes the most ancient alphabet currently known. He identifies a number of names found in the Hebrew bible, Asenath (wife of Joseph, Genesis 41:45 etc.), Ahisimach (Exodus 31:36 etc.), El (meaning "God"), and perhaps most contentiously, Moses.
He supplies the information to help us work out that barely more than a quarter of the letters he has identified have universal agreement, but in only 13% of cases is he making an identification not yet agreed by other experts in the field, which seems quite modest to me. He supplies drawing of every text, and photographs for several of them too, to help you understand the issues and difficulties (e.g. which way does the writing run?). Readers who have some basic Hebrew will find this helps, but the results of his analysis overall are most compelling. I am not entirely comfortable with his chronology (relying on Edmund Thiele, dismissing Rohl Bimson and the "New Chronology", for example). Neither am I convinced by some of the new names he adopts for the Hebrew letters (about half of them). These are trivial issues against the overall importance of showing both that Hebrew-speaking people were present in Egypt (and often not exactly enjoying their lives there), exactly as the Bible has always said, and also that a form of Hebrew was in use around 3,800 years ago which is virtually identical to the Hebrew of the Bible, and legible to modern eyes. This is quite astonishing, as it means that Hebrew is by far the most ancient language that has remained in use one way or another throughout that time, with very little change, and still using a 22-letter basic alphabet. The contrast with English is quite extreme, and our alphabet, which has gained and lost a large number of letters even within the past 1,000 years!

6 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 31, 2018

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This is a ground-breaking book and has the potential to affect many current research practices going forward.

2 people found this helpful

neus

Excelente

Reviewed in Spain on June 22, 2019

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Excelente

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