Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear Bryan,


>Rolf wrote:
><snip>
>

>>
>> 2 Samuel 1:10 (1)
>> 1 Kings 13:33 (1)
>> 2 Kings 19:23,24,25  (4)(the one of v 24 definitely has past meaning, the
>> sequence in 23-25 of way,qat,wey,wey, qat,qat,wey,qat, qat,wey-qat argue
>> that all have past meaning)
>
>Rolf, you often cite the mix of verb forms in a particular passage to
>assert the mix, in and of itself, explodes a particular model of the BH
>verbal system.  You know that I'm hardly a "vav-conversive man." On the
>other hand, your pointing to a verb mix as you do is a bit simplistic for
>me.  Are we to marvel that 2 wayyiqtols, 3 qatals, four yiqtols, a
>participle (or some such mix) are all used in one context?  I'm not too
>confident anyone is marvelling yet.
>
>For instance, without even looking up 2 KI 19:23-25, I can guess that the
>wayyiqtol introduces a quotation.  The quotation, made of a mix of qatals
>and weyiqtols, expresses the present circumstances by the qatals, and the
>speaker's intentions by the weyiqtols, i.e. "here's what has transpired,
>and here's what I intend."  I may be wrong; that's not the point.  All I am
>suggesting is that the verb mix, in and of itself, does not say anything
>about the meanings of the forms.

In principle I agree, a particular mix of forms do not prove anything at
all. On the other hand, a particular mix of forms may be highly
significant. The question about the selection of forms may also illuminate
something of the circularity of discourse analysis, namely, when a form is
assigned a particular role in the discourse system, it is always
interpreted as such simply on the basis of principle, and only secondarily
on the basis if context. Take 2 Kings 19:23-25 as an example:

2Kings 19:22-24 (RSV)¶  "Whom have you mocked (qatal) and reviled
(weqatal)? Against whom have you raised (qatal) your voice and haughtily
lifted (wayyiqtol) your eyes? Against the Holy One of Israel!
By your messengers you have mocked (qatal) the LORD, and you have said
(wayyiqtol),  'With my many chariots I have gone up the heights (qatal)  of
the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon; I (weyiqtol) felled its
tallest cedars, its choicest cypresses; I entered (weyiqtol) its farthest
retreat, its densest forest.  I dug (qatal) wells and drank (weqatal)
foreign waters, and I dried up (weyiqtol) with the sole of my foot all the
streams of Egypt.'

I will always do a discourse analysis of verses like these, not on the
basis of which forms are thought to have this or that function, but on the
basis of the whole context. Having done this, *I* find that there is
nothing we can draw from lexicon, grammar, syntax, or the context
suggesting that the temporal setting is different for some of the verbs.
Therefore I find that the mix of forms have a meaning. The *circular* way
of intepreting the verses goes like this: "The form weyiqtol is not used to
describe past actions, but it is volitive or future, therefore the three
weyiqtols must be translated by future." I am afraid that such kinds of
reasonings prevents the conclusions of the discourse system to be testable.
The sequence (qatal. wayyiqtol, qatal) with past meaning in v 24 strongly
suggests that the two following weyiqtols have past meaning (as long as
nothing in the context shows the opposite). The qatal and weqatal of v 24
just as strongly suggests that the following weyiqtol is past. We should
also keep in mind that many of the weyiqtols of Isaiah have past meaning.
>
>I take it that several translations have rendered the weyiqtols as past.
>So?
>
>1.  Is it poetry?  If so they may be archaic or archaizing yiqtols, the
>"old" Historical Narrative mainline form.

What in the world are archaic or archaizing yiqtols? True, the expressions
are found in the grammars and commentaries, but I have never seen anything
but speculation as to the origin and existence of such forms. It seems to
me that the expressions were coined to try to account for problematic cases
which could not be explained by usual means. If you have any information
about such rare animals, please submit it.

>
>2.  Do the translators follow the LXX?  Maybe they are right to do so, and
>the text they had is better than the MT.  As Niccacci has recently stated,
>I prefer the MT most of the time.

I definitely prefer the MT over the LXX
>
>3.  Is it direct speech embedded within narrative?  If the MT is correct,
>the translators are wrong.  They should have translated the weyiqtols as
>modals, probably volitional forms, "may he, let me, let us, I intend."

Here you fall back on your model, so please be careful. The reason why your
model works so well, is that narrative in Hebrew are governed by extremely
strict rules of linguistic conventions, but the drawback is that it may be
these linguistic conventions that are the primary reason for the choice of
verbs, thus driving the system, and this is of course a pragmatic factor.
Only if *all* examples of w+yiqtol in the MT could be shown to be volitive,
then I would accept that this was the meaning of the form. I do not see any
reason why a conjunction added to a yiqtol should influence its meaning.
>
>Not recalling much poetry in Kings, I would say #1 is unlikely.
>
>Also, Rolf, I noticed many of your 60-something weyiqtols with past
>reference come from Late Biblical Hebrew.  Don't you think this may be an
>issue?

It can be, and should be investigated, but it should not be taken for
granted. We are reading "The Manual of Discipline" in class, and it appears
that even at such a late date, the old verbal system was in use. I have no
data suggesting that after a certain time, weyiqtol could be used instead
of wayyiqtol. We believe that the reason for the punctuation of the
Masoretes was what they heard in the synagogue, and the synagogue did of
course not differentiate between older and newer text. Also taking into
account the possibilities for error,we must presume that weyiqtols are
original.




Regards
Rolf


Rolf Furuli
Lecturer in Semitic languages
University of Oslo