Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

Hi Dave, thanks for your post.  You wrote:

>Bryan:  We must give
> > him room for temporal overlay, paraphrase, leitmotif, slowing narrative
> > time, and, as you say, parallel threads. 
> 
> But how can this be done with a form that is "inherently 
> sequential"?  That's the big question, and I don't really see an 
> answer in this post.  

Well, the writer just does it.  He may do unusual things, but they are
obviously not impossible.  No one put him in grammar-and-composition prison
for his relatively jarring or sudden back-loop.

> 
> > A couple things are going on with all these wayyiqtols is Gen 42, and
with
> > 42:8 specifically.  For one, the advance of time is by small steps.  As
you
> > have pointed out, several events don't *need* to be sequential in a
real
> > world.  The Hebrew writer in this way stretches narrative time, sort of
> > putting the camera into slow-motion, by using a preponderance of the
> > mainline narrative forms but actually describing very little progress. 
In
> > this particular meeting between Jacob's sons, this nicely achieves the
kind
> > of tension which is appropriate to a momentous event in the same way as
> > it's achieved in a movie at a critical moment.
> 
> But in a movie we have (usually) clear indicators that we're in a 
> flashback or a sudden change of scene.  I still don't see any 
> explanation of how a Hebrew writer could accomplish this sort of 
> artistry using a form that is *inherently* and *necessarily* 
> sequential.  It seems to me that if he did, it would defeat his 
> purpose because the inherent and necessary meaning of the verb 
> is contradictory to what he's trying to do.

How about _Citizen Kane_?  Famous for it's 'shock-cutting!' (abrupt cutting
to scenes that are widely separated in time and place)  Orsen Wells should
have been put in story-telling jail?   ;-)   (I heard you.  You said
"usually" re movies)  The interpretation that there is temporal overlay in
Gen 42:8 is principled. The temporal overlay *is* clearly identified by the
repetition of the wayyiqtol of nkr.  See our friend Randall Buth's 1994 
article in _BH and Discourse Linguistics_ or Collins 1995 in _Tyndale
Bulletin_ for the parameters for identifying temporal overlay and more
examples of temporal overlay that begin with wayyiqtol.  In such cases,
sequentiality is not cancelled any more than it is for a discourse-initial
wayyiqtol.  In other languages, good narratives often begin with the
narrative form, a form which if not inherently perfective and/or
sequential, defaults for such.  Here's the first sentence of the first book
I pulled off the shelf, Michener's _The Source_: "On Tuesday the freighter
steamed through the Straights of Gibraltar..."  Such a contruction drops
us, to start with, in the *middle* of a story.  Gen 42:8 drops us, like a
revisited beginning, in the middle of a story. 
 
> 
> > Second, the particular type of case where the writer repeats a previous
> > event (called back-looping or back-referencing) with a wayyiqtol and
then
> > resumes the narrative is temporal overlay.  This is what's going on in
> > 42:8.  To, in a sense, refuse to demote the event to off-the-line
material
> > the second time it is mentioned is basically at odds with the standard
use
> > of the form.  On the other hand, the jarring use of the form creates
> > attention to the passage that is appropriate to its thematic
importance. 
> 
> I'm afraid I can't even make sense of this.  Yes, it's temporal 
> overlay.  But again, temporal overlay is inherently contradictory to a 
> chain of forms that are inherently sequential.  This is not a 
> caricature of the idea of sequentiality, it's the logical conclusion 
> that we end up at if the WP is inherently sequential.  OTOH, if it's a 
> simple-statement tense/form/whatever-we-call-it, then it's a very 
> nice form for doing what you describe because the "jarring use" 
> comes about because of the semantic content of the clause, not 
> because of the verb form.  This provides a smooth and unified 
> explanation of the chain of WP clauses and allows the writer the 
> flexibility you describe (and I agree that he has that flexibility) 
> without having to violate the "inherent" force of the verb form.
> 

The synchronization of sequentiality and temporal overlay are not
impossible (forgive my double-negative--I use it purposely to suggest the
jarring nature of this event) if we can give a principled identification of
the temporal overlay's 'new beginning' and if we can grant that a
sequential form can begin a discourse, which the wayyiqtol plainly does.
 
> > In this particular passage, the writer wanted to bring attention to
this
> > tense meeting between the brothers and the important thematic root nkr.
 In
> > a way the Joseph cycle (as well as the Judah/Tamar pericope) is about
> > "nkr-ing."  Jacob recognizes his son's special garment stained with
blood
> > in Gen 37:33, but he fails to recognize the ruse of his hateful sons. 
> > Judah is then bested by Tamar's clever ruse when he recognizes the
damning
> > evidence possessed by her in 38:26.  Joseph now in 42:7 and 8
recognizes
> > his brothers, but reconcilliation will only be possible when they
recognize
> > and accept that Joseph is a favored man, something that is achieved
through
> > the clever series of tests by the disguised (also the root nkr) Joseph.
 
> > 
> > In summary, I would say that this momentous event and the repetition of
the
> > root nkr (four times) in these verses are at just the strategic place
for
> > the Hebrew writer to do something at odds with the verbal system in
> > general.  In fact, I would consider 42:8 to be an exception that proves
the
> > rule, so to speak.
> 
> I submit that this kind of exegetical-linguistic back-flip is 
> unnecessary unless we are heck-bent on preserving the idea of 
> sequentiality at all costs, a preservation which is also unnecessary.
> 

Are you suggesting that the repetition of the root nkr is not thematic? 
That there is not literary tension in the meeting of the brothers which is
linguistically facilitated?  Whether you see these literary-types of issues
or not, I think you should grant that I may be agnostic as to the idea that
the wayyiqtol is a sequential form, but that I may, as an important and
sincere search for its meaning, defend the idea with every possible means
before I dismiss it.  If nothing else, I think my explantion points out the
dismissal of a sequential wayyiqtol based on Gen 42:8 and like cases is
tenuous.  It cautions against an overly wooden (I'm struggling for the best
word) or legalistic concept of sequentiality.  

Shalom,
Bryan


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

315-437-6744(w)
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