Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Paul Zellmer wrote:
>
> Rolf,
>
>I never said that a discussion of theory is not beneficial, although I do
>think "mandantory" may be too strong a word.  But please let me remind you
>of what you said on Jan 30:
> 
>
> Thank you for answering my Joshua question. Before I give my comments I
>would like to hear your view of two questions.
>(1) (Extremely important). Can "genre" change the semantic meaning of a
>verb form? Wayyiqtol is either past tense, the perfective aspect, the
>imperfective aspect, or a blend of past tense and the perfective aspect.
>The meaning you ascribe to wayyiqtol (and yiqtol, qatal and weqatal) is it
>different in one genre compared with another?
>
>  
>At the time of reading and responding, I saw that question as an attempt
>to force the conversation from the specifics about the passage to a
>general discussion of theories (again!)  And, having reread it again in
>preparation for this response, I still see the same agenda behind the
>question.  Even now, in your supposed comments about the Joshua text, most
>of it is not *about* the Joshua text.
>
>You claim my response does not tell why the diffierent forms are used. 
>Actually, I did, because I clearly stated that that was how the Hebrews of
>that time treated such topics.  If you are asking why they treated such
>topics that way, then I would compare your question to why a word has one
>meaning in one context and another meaning in another.  Etymology is an
>interesting subject, and it *may* help in understanding the semantic range
>of a word, but I'm sure that even you would agree that most native
>speakers don't think through the complete etymology of a word before
>choosing it in a particular context.  They choose the word because, in
>that context, it is the word that carries the message that they are trying
>to express.  In a similar light, an "etymological-like" study for verb
>forms may give the breadth of the range of meaning of the form.  It may
>reveal why a form was originally used in a certain context.  But, by the
>time of the writing of the Tanakh, I would dare posit that most of those
>forms were already "formularized," that the writer used the form that he
>did because that's the form used in the specific context.
>
>Since apparently you think my response was deficient, let me ask you: 
>What is *your* explanation for the variety of forms used?  If it is in
>your comments, I confess that I fail to see it.
>
>As far as your comment of my not considering "static and fientic verbs,"
>please note that, while I did not specifically mention those technical
>terms, I did clearly state:
>
> What we have in these descriptions of the borders of the tribal
>inheritances is
>imbedding of a genre rarely found in the Tanakh, a purely descriptive text
>that is
>non-sequential, non-agent oriented, and non-future (in fact, non-time
>oriented).
>
> Now perhaps you can come up with an example of a fientic verb that is not
>time-oriented, but, in my experience, I am hard put to see words used in
>this way as expressing anything other than states.  If you did not see
>this statement as saying what you claimed I failed to address, then
>apparently what I thought was a very clear statement was not clear at
>all.  Therefore, I am willing to accept the fault for an inadequate
>analysis.
>
>Please forgive me for not addressing your Ezekiel passages on )MD, but I'm
>sure you can see that they do not relate, directly or even closely
>indirectly, to the understanding of the Joshua passages.
>
>Hope this helps you understand my position and my previous posts,



Dear Paul,


Your post clears up several points, so let me also try to do the same. Let
me first point out that the practical work of Bible translation is the
primary reason why I study Hebrew verbs; I don't just do it for the fun of
academic discussion. Before I started on my Ph.D work I used three years to
study applied linguistics and semantics and write a book about Bible
translation.

Any thesis must give an outline of its methodology and assumptions; if this
is lacking it will not be accepted. When the Bible is translated, it is
necessary to have a theory about the relationship between the
morphosyntactic forms of Hebrew and Greek and the morphosyntactical forms
of the receptor language. Regarding the Germanic languages we are
particularly concerned with tense and to a certain degree with aspect.

I did not discuss etymology in my previous post - I agree that "the
etymological fallacy" is a fallacy, though I believe that what I call "the
contextual fallacy" is just as misleading (The contextual fallacy: The view
that words do not have a meaning without a context and its application to
two different situations of communication (the original situation and the
modern one) as if they were just one situation of communication). However,
neither of these fallacies apply to Hebrew verbal conjugations.

Let me make a bold claim of which I hope the list members will respond:

(1) If we have not decided whether tense is grammaticalized in Biblical
Hebrew or not, and have an opinion of the meaning of particular morphologic
forms in relation to their grammaticalization or not, we are not able to
convey the message of the Bible in a faithful way.

(2) If we have not decided whether verb forms such as yiqtol and qatal have
an uncancellable meaning or not, i.e. whether or not the context can change
the aspect and/or tense of a particular form or not,  we are not able to
convey the message of the Bible in a faithful way.

Our standpoint may in time prove to be wrong, but it is a point of
reference by which others can evaluate our translation. If we don't have
such a point of reference, we are either led by our gut feeling or we are
parroting translations or commentaries made by others.  I appreciate both
your discourse analysis and the system on which it is built,  but it tells
me nothing ( or at least very little) about the tense or aspect I should
choose in a translation of a poetic or prophetic text. So I need something
more - a theory of the meaning of the morphologic forms in Hebrew.

The evolutionary hypothesis of the survival of the fittest is truly a
tautology: Who is the fittest? The one who survives! I would not equate
discourse analysis with this hypothesis, but some parts of it surely is
tautological, at least as far as the goal is to establish meaning. It was
Harald Weinreich who in 1964 first introduced discourse analysis as a means
to aquire the meaning of verbs. However, he himself admitted that his
system was "unassailable" (not falsifyable or testable) ( H. Weinreich,
1970, "Tense and Time" in "Archivum Linguisticum 1 (New Series) p 40). W
Schneider, 1974, "Grammatik des Biblischen Hebräisch" wrote a Hebrew
Grammar on the basis of Weinreich's system, and A. Niccacci, 1986, "The
Syntax of the Verb in classical Hebrew Prose" followed the same road.

The basic problem with discourse analysis is testability. We can to a great
extent identify narrative, poetry and direct speech, and we can in many
instances know what are main clauses and dependent clauses. The problem,
however, when we come to the details, is the same as with the survival of
the fittest; there is no independent parameter by which we can
differentiate between verb forms and the smallest discourse units where we
expect particular forms to occur. But the verb forms expected to occur in
this or that unit identify the unit as such, and when the nature of the
unit is established by help of the verb form, the fact that it occurs in
that unit is used as a confirmation of the theory.  Let me stress that much
of discourse analysis is based on a sound intuition, and that we cannot
demand falsifyability for all methods used in the study of dead languages.
I therefore find much valuable in discourse analysis, but I am not able to
so how it can establish verbal meaning which can be the basic help for a
Bible translator.

I do not think that my approach is the only right one, and I am always open
for arguments and ideas. But I seek as far as possible parameters and
theories that can be tested, and I try to be as consistent as possible. The
best approach I have found is the one that defferentiates between
pragmatics and semantics on the basis of cancelability. I have recently
made a study of Psalm 18 (suggested by Bryan) compared with 2 Sam 22, and I
invite you to comment on the specifics of this Psalm when I send it.


Regards
Rolf

Rolf Furuli
Lecturer in Semitic languages
University of Oslo