ABSTRACT
The chapter discusses the work of Hurvitz, Polzin, Rendsburg, some of their students, and Polak. It aims to summarise these scholars' working principles and methodology and illustrates the type of linguistic evidence they cite in their discussions of Early Biblical Hebrew (EBH) vs. Late Biblical Hebrew (LBH). In addition to the attestation of distinctive LBH features in late Aramaic and Hebrew sources, Hurvitz argues that the antiquity of the Archaic Biblical Hebrew (ABH) and EBH strata are confirmed by similarities between ABH and Amama Canaanite and Ugaritic and between EBH and monarchic-era inscriptions. Bergey begins his thesis with a more detailed discussion of linguistic diachrony in general than one finds in Hurvitz's publications. Polak has argued in about a dozen articles over the past twenty years or so that EBH and LBH books reflect different styles of writing which have their origins in successive historical contexts and social conditions.
