[Mesorah] At/Atah

[Michael Hamm]

On Monday, 25 Aug 2008, R' Raphael Davidovich wrote, in part,
about Rashi to B'reshis 2:23:
> I thought the Chazal was about Adam Harishon, which could
> conceivably lead a person to conclude that Hebrew is the
> literal first language, which led to my counter-argument
> that this is no reason to think that it must also be the
> origin of all post-Mabul languages.
>
> However, Chazal say even less than that.  The claim, which
> is pure Medrash that has no practical human language
> conclusion, is that Hashem created the world with Hebrew.
> That has NOTHING to do with the development of languages in
> the history of Olam Hazeh.  It is entirely plausible to
> suggest that while from a aggedeta point of view, Hebrew was
> the "language" that made Creation, Hebrew as a human language
> evolved and developed in a manner similar to all other
> languages.

The context of the Rashi (the pasuk) implies that Adam spoke the language 
in question.  Even if we ignore Rashi, each of the following statements 
seems either reasonable or Jewish to me:
   1.  One person was created first, and was able to speak
       intelligently as soon as he was created, or soon after.
   2.  That person spoke only one language on a regular basis
       at the time he was first able to speak.
   3.  That language thus did not descend from any other.
Am I to understand that you, R'RD, wish to argue that that language was 
something other than Hebrew (l'shon kodesh), despite the Rashi alluded to 
above, and that Rashi was referring only to the creation of the world and 
not the language Adam spoke, despite the context of the Rashi?  Or that 
that language Adam spoke was other than Hebrew, despite the context of the 
Rashi, and that Rashi, and the midrash he's quoting, decided to lie, and 
say it was Hebrew even though it was actually Proto-Whatever, just for the 
sake of d'rash?  Either one seems to me, if you'll excuse me, far-fetched. 
And if Adam spoke a different language, what sort of language was it, and 
why did he speak it?  I mean this from a Jewish point of view.  That is, 
if the world was created with Hebrew, or, at least, if the Torah is in it, 
then why would Hashem create the first person speaking Proto-Whatever, or 
how did he develop it?  It all seems to me so unreasonable.

R'RD also refers to Hebrew's not being the "origin of all post-Mabul 
languages".  I agree.  But it did predate them, as far as I can currently 
understand, which is a separate issue.

I am willing to be convinced otherwise.

Michael Hamm
AM, Math, Wash. U. St. Louis
msh210 at math.wustl.edu                Fine print:
http://www.math.wustl.edu/~msh210/ ... legal.html