Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Moon-Ryul Jung" <moon AT computing.soongsil.ac.kr>]

Dear Peter,

>One more difference is that 
> in Hebrew X-qatal is continued with wayyiqtol, whereas English 
> continues with past perfect.
> 
> Peter Kirk

In relation to Dave's confirmation that simple past can continue past 
perfect, I would like to recall what Niccacci posted on Feb 23. He said:

  1 Sam 25:1 gives the historical information with a chain of NARRATIVE
  wayyiqtol:
(1)
  (a) And Samuel died [wayyiqtol]
  (b) and all Israel gathered [idem]
  (c) and they made lament for him[idem]
   (d) and they buried him [idem]
  
1 Sam 28:3 retrieves the first piece of information with a non-narrative 
construction [x+qatal]; then it goes with CONTINUATION wayyiqtol:
(2)
  (a) Now Samuel had died [x+qatal]
  (b) and all Israel had made lament [wayyiqtol] for him
  (c) and they had buried him [Idem].

Niccacci, Peter, Bryan, Dave, Galia and others have showed that x+qatal is 
a way to introduce a "digression" into the narrative. Wayyiqtol clauses 
that appear in a
digression are called CONTINUATION wayyiqtols by Niccacci. I think that the 
distinction between NARRATIVE wayyqtol and CONTINUATION
wayyiqtol is helpful. But the distinction is not absolute because a 
narrative may have  a several layers of digressions.

To preserve the similarity or symmetry between the mainline of the 
narrative and a digression, I would translate 1 Sam 28:3 as follows:

(3)
  (a) Now Samuel had died [x+qatal]
  (b) All Israel made lament [wayyiqtol] for him
  (c) They buried him [Idem].

Notice that wayyiqtols after x-qatal are translated to simple past 
clauses.
If many English speakers like (3) better than (2), it may be considered 
another evidence that English simple past is quite similar to wayyiqtol.

I like (3) better than (2). Let me try to analyze (2) and (3), and see why
(3) is preferred. 

In (3), the reference time is given by the preceding narrative. Clause (a)
describes the situation at the reference time by referring to an event 
that
produced the situation. The candidates for the reference time for clause 
(b)
are the current reference time and the event time of Samuel's death, which
has been introduced by clause (a). In general, it is possible for
clause (b) to pick up its reference time AFTER the current reference time.
But in this case, the reference time of clause (b) is set to the event 
time
of clause (a). Clause (c) picks up its reference time AFTER the reference 
time
of clause (b).   

However, in (2), where clauses (b) and (c) have past perfect forms, 
clauses
(b) and (c) do not introduce a new reference time. All three clauses 
describe
the situation at the current reference time by referring to past events. In 
this
respect, (2) would correspond to three x+qatal clauses. The temporal 
ordering between these past events are not "respected" by these past 
perfect forms, though, because of world knowledge, the temporal order is 
visible to the reader. In general, it is all right not to respect temporal 
ordering between situations; aspectual catergory exists in language to 
depict real situations subjectively and  selectively. But in this case, 
some readers may be bothered
by the verb forms that do not respect so obvious a temporal ordering.

But because I am not a native English speaker, my intution may not be 
correct :-)

Sincerely,

Moon-Ryul Jung, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Dept of Computer Science
Soongsil University,
Seoul, Korea