Masoretic Notations of Personal Names

Of the approximately fifteen-hundred personal names in the Hebrew Bible the Masorah designates only ninety or so with a notation that they are personal names. The reason why the Masorah selects these ninety names for special mention is because they are all homonyms. They have the same form, same consonants and vowels as other words, and thus are liable to be confused with those words. This article will survey the usages of Masoretic personal name notations, examine the type of names covered by these notations, and explore names that are selected because of specific accents or spelling. One of the surprising results of our analysis of the Masoretic personal naming notes is the discovery that the Masoretes had identified a name that has been ignored by modern scholarship.