06-25-2010, 09:33 AM
The simplest explanation is your second possibility... as Greek doesn't have any convenient way to emulate the sh sound, it appears that the variation between Shim'on and Simawn disappears here. The Aramaic vowels for Simon are interesting though: rather than an esasa (i.e. the vowel on the ayin in [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]Jw9my4[/font] [Shim'on/Shim'un]) preceding the [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]w[/font], there is a zqafa (e.g. the vowels in [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]0ml4[/font] [Shlama]) and in many but not all cases, {zqafa preceding [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]w[/font]} is transliterated as an omicron, which has an ah sound (and possibly took on an aw sound at times). Of course, this is all with respect to Eastern zqafa as opposed to Western zqofo.
What I don't understand is the decision to transliterate [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]Jw9my4[/font] (Shim'on) as Sim?n rather than Sume?n (the latter one as the historical precedent for transliteration [i.e. LXX]). I'm only speculating now, but it's possible the name passed through Greek twice... once to become Greek Sim?n (Sea-mahn) and then to Aramaic [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]Jwmys[/font] (Sea-mawn) and then to Greek Sim?n (Sea-moan): but it's just as likely that this variant arose only in Aramaic and was consistent over Greek usage. It could also be the case that the vowel marks written were not consistent with the original pronunciation due to the time gap between the original records and the vowel addendum. In any case, my speculation doesn't tell much about the origin of the name though, since one would expect an omicron-sigma to end the name if it were of Greek origin.
And that's all I have to say about that <!-- s
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What I don't understand is the decision to transliterate [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]Jw9my4[/font] (Shim'on) as Sim?n rather than Sume?n (the latter one as the historical precedent for transliteration [i.e. LXX]). I'm only speculating now, but it's possible the name passed through Greek twice... once to become Greek Sim?n (Sea-mahn) and then to Aramaic [font="Estrangelo (V1.1)"]Jwmys[/font] (Sea-mawn) and then to Greek Sim?n (Sea-moan): but it's just as likely that this variant arose only in Aramaic and was consistent over Greek usage. It could also be the case that the vowel marks written were not consistent with the original pronunciation due to the time gap between the original records and the vowel addendum. In any case, my speculation doesn't tell much about the origin of the name though, since one would expect an omicron-sigma to end the name if it were of Greek origin.
And that's all I have to say about that <!-- s
--><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!-- s -->