Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Bryan Rocine" <596547 AT ican.net>]

Hi Rolf,

We can certainly go to poetry for many curious combinations of verb forms. 
But they seem so strange only because they do not fit the traditional
understanding of the verbal semantics of BH.  We seem to have to "throw
out" much of what we learned in first year BH when we get to poetry, and,
in fact, this inadequacy of explanation of the verb forms as they are used
in poetry is one of the main reasons I find traditional explanations of the
verbal semantics of BH unsatisfactory.  Are we to believe that BH poetry
was not written in BH?  Hardly!  Are the meanings of the verb forms so
flexible as to be irrelevant?  Hardly!

At 06:35 AM 8/15/98 +0200, you wrote:
>Bryan Rocine wrote:
>
><I would appreciate, if you have the time,  that you would name a
"curious"
><passage or two to the list for discussion even if you don't have time to
><participate in the discussion yourself.  Thanks!
>
>One "curious" passage is  PSALM 107

Since the psalm is pretty long, I'll comment on only the section which you
label as part four(vv. 21-30) in which there is a fairly chaotic, by
traditional standards, and translations seem to be split as to the
time-reference of the passage.

>The Psalm starts with the exhortation "give thanks to YHWH". A similar
>exhortation is found in verses 8,15,21(22), and 31(32). So the Psalm
>consists of five parts: vv 2-7, 9-14, 16-20, 23-30, and 33-43. The most
>important  problem is the time perspective of each part, and to find that
>is not easy, a fact which is seen in the different choices of the
following
>10 translations:
>
>
>
>NWT    past  2-20,  present 23-42, fut  43
>NRSV   past  2-30,  present 33-42
>NAB    past 1-42,   present 43
>ASV    past 1-16,   present 17-42, fut 43
>NASB   past 1-30,   present 33-43
>NIV    past 1-41,  present  42-43
>NJB    past 1-36,  present  37-43
>NKJV   past 1-20       , present  23-43, fut 43
>RSV    past 1-30,  present  33-43
>TEV          past 1-41,  present  42-43
>
>
>The most natural thing would be for all the verbs in each part to have the
>same time setting (past, present or future), and this is the way most of
>the above translations take the text. This, however, is at odds with
>traditional grammar. We find the following verb forms in each part:
>
>PART 1,  v 2-7:     QATAL 4, WAYYIQTOL 2, YIQTOL  3
>PART 2.  v 9-14 :  QATAL 5, WAYYIQTOL 2, YIQTOL 3
>PART 3.  v 16-20: QATAL 2, WAYYIQTOL 2, YIQTOL 4, WEYIQTOL 2
>PART 4.  v 23-30: QATAL 1, WAYYIQTOL 7, YIQTOL 8, WEYIQTOL 1
>PART 5.  v 33-43: QATAL 1, WAYYIQTOL 12,YIQTOL 4, WEYIQTOL 3
>

<snip>

>Three translations takes part 4 as present, NWT, ASV, and NKJV, while the
>rest keep on the past setting. The 1 QATAL and 7 WAYYIQTOLS of this
section
>would suggest past time, while the 8 YIQTOLS and the one WEYIQTOL suggest
>present or future time.

<snip>

>
>Regards
>Rolf

V. 21-22, as you said divides this section from the others with its
admonition to thank YHWH for His grace and "wonderful works for the
children of men."  I think the time of the section is determined by the
nature of the works.  If the works are specific references to the known
past, I think we would prefer the past tense translation.  If it is a more
general reference to "the kind of thing that YHWH does," we would lean
toward the present tense translation.  The passage seems to be of the more
general sort described by analogy to the expreience of seamen.  The thrust
of the passage is therefore *expository rather than narrative*.  There are
some brief references to a passage of narrative time, mostly coincidental
with ther wayyiqtols, but the thrust of the passage is expository which
coincides best in English with the present tense.

As for the qatal in v. 24, _ra)u_, I have no problem with it or any other
qatal referring to present time, because it is the special timeless form
for pinning an attribute on a subject, here, the seamen.  "It is they who
are seers."  

The yiqtols describe emerging action, here in descriptive present time to
give the habitual sense, v. 26 "They mount heavenward.  They sink to the
depths.  Their soul, in trouble, melts."

The wayyiqtols, being thought of as a preterite or perfective form, are not
necessarily inconsistent with the present time.  Paul Hopper
("Introduction,"__Tense and Aspect:Between Semantics and Pragmatics_1982)
cites an example from unpublished section of Alan Timberlake's work on
Russian("Invarience and the Syntax of Russian Aspect,"  Ibid.).  Timberlake
gives the translation without the Russian:

"While I was around the colonists never misbehaved(Impfv) or
bothered(Impfv) the travellers, but when I wasn't they allowed(Impfv)
themselves some dirty tricks, so that soon Zadarov refused(Pfv) to take the
revolver and demanded(Pfv) that I absolutely had to spend time out on the
road.  So I began(Pfv) to go out with every detachment, but still
gave(Impf) the revolver to Zadarov..."

The habitual events do not discontinue with the verbs in the perfective
form which are translated "refused," "demanded," "began."  The use of the
perfective in the "imperfective setting" serves to express situations in
sequence while the imperfective forms express habitual, *unsequenced*
actions.  It is Hopper and Timberlake's point that the *invariantly
perfective aspect* of the Russian perfective form is over-ridden by the
surrounding imperfectives *but not without significance*.  This is the kind
of combination we may be seeing in v. 29 "He puts the gale quiet and then
their waves became(become) quiet."

Shalom,
Bryan


B. M. Rocine
Associate Pastor
Living Word Church
6101 Court St. Rd.
Syracuse, NY 13208

315-437-6744(w)
315-479-8267(h)