Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Henry Churchyard <churchyh AT ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>]

>>>>> From: Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>

>>>>> You are correct that I ignored stress-shift in non lamed-he
>>>>> forms. I should have said that to add the prefix waw would
>>>>> increase the number of syllabels, thus affecting the position of
>>>>> the stress and resulting in apocopation in many instances.

>> Henry Churchyard <churchyh AT ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>

>> I don't think so -- the stress is always determined from the end of
>> the word (at a diachronically earlier stage always on the
>> penultimate syllable, with some modifications and complications by
>> the time of Biblical Hebrew, as discussed in Blau's 1976 outline
>> grammar, for example), so it seems quite unprecedented and
>> unparalleled for the presence of a prefix to cause stress shift,
>> especially when an alternative diachronic explanation of the stress
>> distributions is available).

> From: Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>

> I agree with you that stress is determined from the end of the word,
> but this can hardly be the only factor. Let us take a closer look at
> the example Psalm 21:2. Here we have the compound ma(h)-yyfgel with
> penultimate stress. In Psalm 16:9 we find the wayyiqtol form
> wayyfgel also with penultimate stress. The last form is formally
> jussive and the first form may also be viewed this way.  In Psalm
> 53:7 we find the jussive yfgel, in Zephania 3:17 we find the yiqtol
> indicative yfgil and in Habakkuk 1.15 we find the weyiqtol weyfgil,
> all three with ultimate stress. Could you please explain why the the
> forms of Psalm 21:2 and 16:9 have penultimate stress while the other
> three have ultimate stress? I cannot see that this is determined
> from the end.

As far as I can tell, from standard traditional reference works I have
here, you're conflating together forms from the two roots g-y-l and
g-l-y.  Truncated forms derived from the lamedh-he root g-l-y would be
stressed before g (as in wayyigel), and untruncated forms would
stressed after l (as in yigleh), but from basic phonological
patterning, we would expect never to find stress on a vowel between
the g and l consonants of this root, because such vowels would always
be epenthetic.  By contrast, in the case of the root g-y-l the basic
expected stress position would be between g and l, though this can be
disturbed by various factors (addition of heavy suffix, consecutive
imperfect stress shift, etc.).

> Regarding my comment on 2 Kings 7:4 What I wanted to say was that in
> pausal forms of qatal with penultimate stress, a wf-prefix (and not
> a we-prefix) would even mark consecutive perfects, suggesting that
> wa- and we- are the same lexeme.

But this waa- (i.e. wa- spelled with qamets not preceding guttural +
h.at.eph-pathah.) occurs before different verb tenses, before nouns --
basically before any part of speech whatever in more or less "pausal"
position (Gesenius and Kautsch 1910:306-307).  I don't see how you
naturally get from wa- with qamets occurring grammatically
indiscriminately before any pausal form with intial stressed syllable,
to wa- with pathah. which geminates a following consonant that occurs
only before specific verb forms (without distinction between pausal
and non-pausal).  To me these remain two different things.

> If shewa in the days of the Masoretes was pronounced as an "a" ,
> (there is evidence for this) and the difference between shewa and
> patah is minute, the particular semantic difference between weyiqtol
> and wayyiqtol which the first Hebrew grammarian ascertained need not
> exist at all.

I'm still not sure whether you think that the Tiberian consecutive
imperfect is a survival from the early Semitic *yaqtul preterite or an
invention of 1000 A.D.  If your position is the latter, then there are
some awful suspicious coincidences regarding stress position, "e"/"o"
vowels instead of long "i"/"u" vowels in final syllables, etc. that
need to be explained away...

--
         --Henry Churchyard     churchyh AT ccwf.cc.utexas.edu