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The Great Tartan Disputation. Round Two
The Great Tartan Disputation. Round Two
Orignally Posted as:
Brit-Am Now no. 1436
#1. Brit-Am Answers More Criticism from TG about the Coat of Joseph
We are continuing our Disputation with TG. This is Round Two following on from Round One
and concerning the subject matter of our article Joseph and the Scottish Tartan.
Round Two is Below.
Round TWO.
re The Scottish Tartan Cloak of Joseph.
http://www.britam.org/tartan.html
TG remarks:
Of course I know the names, but what if I want to go and see how they arrive
at their conclusions? Its not good enough to pull names off the internet...you
have to quote the sefer [i.e. book] and the page number/section.
================================================
Brit-Am Replies:
All the quotations we used (unless we said otherwise) refer to Commentaries on
Genesis 37:3. This is the fourth or fifth time I have had to repeat this.
Check it out.
================================================
Brit-Am said:
This is Classical Hebrew as used by
the Commentators and as used today in Spoken Modern Hebrew. The Hebrew spoken
today in Israel
is that of the traditional sources along with some modernizing input from
academic experts on the language who have been appointed to the task. In
addition the language has an inner dynamism and logic of its own. A very
significant proportion of the Jews already had some familiarity with Hebrew
(through religious studies) before coming to Israel. If a Hebrew word in
present-day usage has a certain meaning then this is worth considering when
coming to question the original meaning of the word. In this case we also have
the same usage in the Classical sources.
It may be that your knowledge of Hebrew is lacking but in questions such as
the present one you should not rely only on English language dictionaries and
based on correspondence with you that is what you are doing.
TG remarked:
Not really interested in what is spoken today. You can't darshen [i.e. deduct by logic or analogy]
from Modern Hebrew something that was stated 4000 years ago, or even 1000
years ago.
What academic sources? Who appointed them?
================================================
Brit-Am Replies:
There is a Committee for the Hebrew
Language comprised of senior academicians. It is appointed by University bodies
under the direction of the Ministry of Education.
How can you quote from academics yet protest our own respect for the above
Committee alongside the vernacular usage?
================================================
TG Remarked:
So how do you derive from the 'certain meaning' of passim that
the word includes allusion to colours?
================================================
Brit-Am Replies:
See the Conclusion at the bottom of page
1.
http://britam.org/tartan.html
===============================================
TG Remarked:
If you use a source, you should know something about it. There are no original
translation manuscripts. Most MS are edited versions, in fact fragments there
of, and current versions in use only date from the Renaissance (16th century).
If you go to any xtian site for translation of the Septuagint, you will see
the translation of 'coat of many colours', for example here:
http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/page/31-50, but look in the
Artscroll translation of the Chumash, and you will not see the many colours.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
What will you see?
Artscroll
is a useful source and respected but it does not claim to be authoritative.
They rely on the sources like all others.
Apparently our article on Joseph and the Scottish Tartan design was not yet
available when they produced their commentary.
Not that it would make much difference but who knows?
Others have been influenced by us on other issues.
===============================================
TG Remarked:
The reason is that over the centuries there were many editing of
the Septuagint, and corruptions crept in.
Even Midrash Tanhuma which was written before the [Talmud] Bavli was completed also
uses 'coat of many colours' because it was likely to have also been influenced
by the Greek version then in use in the region.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
Thank you for this source.
I am very fond of Midrash
Tanhuma.
But where exactly?
You are the one constantly requesting the exact location of the sources and I
give them to you.
The one time you mention a source of interest we were not aware of you neglect
to tell us its place!
The Sages quoted in Midrash
Tanhuma
knew Hebrew and a good portion of the Scriptures (sometimes all of it) by heart.
They were the last ones who would have had need of the
Septuagint
or been influenced by it.
Your attitude in effect borders on a certain degree of self-contradiction and compromisation.
In the past [i.e. in previous correspondence] you have criticized us for not
adhering sufficiently to what the Sages say or rather to what you understood
them as saying. When however you come across a source in which the Sages express
an opinion agreeing with our own and not with yours you reject what they say
with the claim that they were under Greek influence!!
You have no proof of this as you yourself admit. You just assume it since it does not fit in with your claims!
===============================================
TG remarked:
Joseph's garment is explicitly mentioned in the Talmud (Shabbat 10b):
A person should never discriminate among his sons even to the extent of a
thread [of a garment] weighing only two selayim milat, similar to that which
Jacob gave to Joseph but not to the other brothers. This gift made the
brothers jealous and caused our forefathers to go down to Egypt.
The Ba'al HaTurim (Jacob ben Asher) and Radak also make the same point.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
What point? Be more precise.
===============================================
TG remarked:
Rashi, in his commentary on this passage, explains ketonet passim
as keli milat karpas, a term for clothing of fine wool similar to karpas in the Book
of Esther, and to the striped garment of Tamar in II Samuel 13:18. Esther was in
Persia of course, so the sound of the word is similar to the Persian karafs,
defined as "a plant of which a salad is made from . . . parsley . . . [and]
celery."
Later references to karpas in the Mishnah, Tosefta, and Talmud, derive it from
the Greek karpos, meaning "fruit" of the land or of rivers. Thus, in talmudic usage the word is
similar to Greek karpos and Persian or Sanskrit kirpas, i.e. resembing a
vertically-striped vegetable.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
There you are! Stripes.
Pasim
means stripes. The striped garment. I looked at this source and did not see
that.
[And to think I suspected you were wasting my time.]
===============================================
Brit-Am said:
Just because it is Christian does not
make it wrong. It was based on
Classicial sources and on
scholars who consulted Rabbinical authorities.
That does not make it automatically correct but it is worth noting.
You say it is misinterpretation because you dislike the implications that
Brit-Am ascribes to it NOT due to intrinsic examination.
TG remarked:
You must be joking! What xtians consulted classical Jewish sources?
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
All of them, including Jerome.
===============================================
TG:
Hebrew was not even learned outside the Church until mid-17th
century.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
Queen Elizabeth-1 (1533-1603) of England
knew Hebrew. Who did she learn if from?
===============================================
TG:
It is not even worth noting because it has been proven that many
translations in the xtian versions were products of editing to suit xtian
dogma. In case you are not aware, the use of 'coat of many colours' is just
such an allusion because it likens Jesus to Josef lehavdil [i.e. may the difference be noticed!] who is supposedly
also welcoming of all who come to him.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
I never knew that. Neither do I really
care one way or the other.
The 'coat of many colours'
coincides with the understanding of the greatest of all the Rabbinical
Commentators.
Nachmanides
conducted a public Disputation against Christianity and had to flee for his life
after winning it.
Our opinion is the same as his.
===============================================
TG:
I say it is a misinterpretation because you have not shown any
substantial proof as to why this word should suggest the coat had colours?
On the other hand a long coat does make sense since it signifies someone who
is not going to do work because it is hard to work in such a coat. If you want
proof, look at the coats that Roman nobility wore, and which were worn
subsequently by the Church hierarchy. Similar coats were, and still are also
worn by the academics from medieval times, mimicking Greeks from the Platonian
era.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
What has this to do with Joseph? We
should not have to show why but whether or not it was so.
That is what we have done.
We have shown it was so, as we said.
===============================================
TG:
In any case, in LXX the translation is chitona poikilon
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
I do not read Greek, TG.
Apparently you do.
Is it only English and Hebrew that sometimes give you difficulty?
===============================================
TG:
The Daat Mikra editors have sought to present an interpretation
based primarily upon Peshat [i.e. simple meaning], the direct, literal reading of the text, as
opposed to Drash [i.e. meaning deduced by logical reasoning and analogy]. Admittedly I don't have it, but can go and see it in the
library. However, I have my doubts that given the emphasis on peshat it will
offer more than Kline
http://www.balashon.com/2006/08/klein
-etymological-dictionary-of-hebrew.html
in terms of etymology.
===============================================
Brit-Am:
This (Kline) is a modern academic
English-language dictionary.
We sometimes use such sources but prefer Hebrew ones when dealing with matters
of the Hebrew language.
What does it say there anyway?
You refer to it but do not quote it.
===============================================
TG:
In any case, how many colours do you think were available to
Yaakov? How many stips of different colours were there if this version is
correct? Why were colours important?
===============================================
Brit-Am:
How should I know?
Look at the Egyptian illustrations of Hebrew or Canaanite dignitaries wearing
garments of the sort described.
http://britam.org/tartan2.html#Patterns
They seem to have had enough colors
available.
===============================================
TG:
I have not seen anything in the Torah she b'al beh [Oral Law
i.e. Words of the Sages] to answer these seemingly important questions.
===============================================
Brit-Am:
You yourself, in this very posting, have just brought us
quotations from the Talmud, Rashi, and Midrash Tanchuma all supporting the
Brit-Am understanding of the expression under consideration. And Brit-Am has
shown how the major Rabbinical Commentators also held the same opinion.
What
more do you want?
===============================================
Brit-Am said:
I gave you the source i.e. Rabbi David Kimchi (Radak), "Sefer
HaShorashim" on the word "pas".
Now go search for an English Translation.
TG:
No, it is your job to cite sources of your research, not mine. I
want the page number in the Hebrew edition thank you.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
I said:
Rabbi David Kimchi
(Radak),
"Sefer
HaShorashim"
on the word "pas".
"Sefer
HaShorashim"
is a kind of dictionary. There are different editions of this work each one of
which is liable to have a different order of pages.
The entries however remain the same. The entries are arranged in alphabetical
order. The order of letters in the Hebrew Alphabet remains the same. "Pas"
starts with "P". Look it up.
===============================================
Look up Genesis 37:3 and 2-Samuel 13:18.
These are the only two places in the entire Bible where the expression "Cotonet
Pasim"
is found.
===============================================
TG:
You are evading the inevitable.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
Which is? What is inevitable?
Grow up TG.
This is Brit-Am, Movement of the Lost Ten Tribes.
We have been around for some time and dealt with others before you.
===============================================
Brit-Am said:
The Commentators however
say that the coat was of differing colors in lines and squares in patterns
similar to those worn by people in the region of Canaan as depicted on
Egyptian walls.
TG:
Which commentators say this?
===============================================
Brit-Am:
See the Table of Opinion at the bottom
of page 1.
http://britam.org/tartan.html
===============================================
TG:
The main point of the article is to link Scots to Jews via the
supposed retention of tradition for making kilts in a chequered pattern.
However, this form of weaving was unknown in the Ancient Mesopotamia or Egypt.
The images of Egyptians you produced to not conclusively show just such a
weaving at all. You are therefore extrapolating something to fit your already
made-up mind based on virtually evidence for support.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
I am not sure that the form of weaving
was not known in the Ancient Mesopotamia or Egypt. The patterns are very
similar, almost the same.
Primitive weaving of tartan type designs apparently is done by the specialized
used of weaver's weights of a type that Barber ("The Mummies of
Urumchi"
by Elizabeth Wayland Barber, 1999) says in Greece "turn up all over Bronze Age
and even Neoloithic
sites" (Barber p.59).
We do indeed link Scots to Ancient Israelites.
The retention of tartan as you say is not a proof of ours. We even accept the
possibility that at one stage the Scottish lost their tartan tradition but
received it once again from Ireland. We simply think that it is significant that
this characteristic sign of Joseph has become a Scottish national symbol while
disappearing everywhere else.
===============================================
Brit-Am said:
Our article aimed to show
what the coat probably looked like and to point out that the said design was a
tartan one or highly similar to it.
This reflects Divine Providence and an instinctive awareness by the Scottish
concerning their ancestry from Joseph.
TG:
Who are you to say what it reflects? It certainly does not
reflect on why the Jews did not adopt just such a garment although they had
far more reason to do so than the Scots, or the Gaels for that matter. Nowhere
is there any mention of Jews wearing this particular garment, including the
Romans who encountered all three peoples.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
Who am I to say what it does not
reflect?
Who are you to ask me such a question?
Some of the Jews may indeed have worn a tartan robe as we will see in continuing
instalments
of this enthralling series.
Stay tuned.
===============================================
TG:
However, the kilt, or more correctly, the Great Kilt, was not the
original form of dress for the Scots, trews were. These are described as being
worn by the Gaels during their wars with Rome, and Scots came to Scotland from
Ireland, and were related to Gaels. The earliest illustrations of these in
Europe are from the Book of Kells which show both single colour and chequered
trews. The fashion for wearing the kilt, and the kilt particular weaving came
much later in the late medieval or perhaps even Renaissance period.
Now, if indeed as you suggest the patterning was based on the cloak made for
Joseph, how do you explain the use of this patterning by Gaels in Spain and
France during Roman times? The truth is that you can't because it would ruin
your own preconceived theory that so many ignorants of Scottish ancestry who
do not question your sources or reasoning have accepted unquestioningly.
===============================================
Brit-Am Replies:
Please tell me what my "own preconceived
theory" is supposed to be?
I suspect some of your historical points may be inaccurate but even if they are
not:
What difference does it make?
Today the Scottish use the tartan design as a national symbol.
All over the world this design is associated with the Scottish.
It was once that of Joseph.
What more needs to be said?
Continued in Round Three.
The Great Tartan Disputation
Contents:
Introduction
Round One.
Round Two.
Round Three.
Round Four.
Round Five.
Round Six.
Discussion and Queries.
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