Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Dave Washburn" <dwashbur AT nyx.net>]

Lee,
> Dave,
> I forgot to respond to the last part of your post:
> 
> Dave Washburn wrote:
> 
> >
> > I'm going to go out on a limb here and state something that I
> > haven't said publicly before, but have held for years: I don't think
> > there truly is such a thing as the weqatal.  It has no distinct form,
> > very unlike the WP (except for the Masoretic accentuation, which
> > may or may not be accurate) and can be explained just as easily
> > as a simple qatal that happens to occur at the beginning of a
> > clause with a conjunction.  We are told in our baby Hebrew
> > classes that there are examples of W+qatal that are not weqatals,
> > yet we're supposed to accept that somehow somebody knows the
> > difference.  I don't buy it.  As you pointed out, the "conversive" idea
> > is more than a little suspect, and I tend to wonder if the medieval
> > grammarians didn't come up with the 4-part verbal system with two
> > unconverted and two converted forms for the sake of symmetry.
> 
> I was not suggesting a 4-part verb system.  I believe in a 2-part system.  
> I was only
> describing weqatal in the way it functions to continue other verb forms.  
> You did not really
> respond to that issue.

I thought I did, but obviously I wasn't clear enough.  I don't think the 
*form* weqatal functions in this way.  I don't think there is a distinct 
weqatal form at all.  When a qatal with the conjunction continues 
something, it is the semantics and pragmatics of the clauses 
themselves that bring this about, not the form of the verb.  Does 
that clear it up?

Dave Washburn
http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur
A Bible that's falling apart means a life that isn't.