Biblical Hebrew Forum

[peter_kirk AT SIL.ORG]

Dear Rolf,

If you remember rightly, a few months ago I brought up the Russian 
idiom "Poshli!" which is past in form but future in meaning, as a 
possible counter-example to some statement of yours (I think) to the 
effect that a past tense must always be past with no exceptions. You 
did not accept this counter-example because it was a special idiomatic 
use. In the same way, the examples of hendiadys which you quoted in 
Ruth are special idiomatic uses which, by your own argument, do not 
count as counter-examples. So to me your post does not contain any 
examples disproving the proposition (which I have recast in positive 
form) "Sequentiality is the semantic meaning of wayyiqtol."

On the other hand, we had a long discussion about this very issue some 
months ago. I found especially telling an example of unmarked temporal 
overlay in the Joseph narrative. The conclusion I and some others 
reached was that "Sequentiality is not the semantic meaning of 
wayyiqtol," but rather that wayyiqtol is the default unmarked past 
tense, which is usually but not always sequential by pragmatic 
implicature, whereas other past tense forms such as X-qatal are 
semantically marked for background, temporal overlay or however one 
might put it.

Peter Kirk


______________________________ Reply Separator 
_________________________________
Subject: Re: Tidbits from Ruth
Author:  furuli AT online.no at internet
Date:    25/04/1999 16:17


Dear Peter and Randall,


The only possible conclusion that can be drawn from your posts is that 
sequentality is not *the semantic meaning* of wayyiqtol but only a 
pragmatic implicature! The requirement for sequentiality as a semantic 
meaning would be that wayyiqtols *allways* would express a sequence (the 
following wayyiqtol would always express an action occurring after the one 
expressed by the previous wayyiqtol). However, you both state that this is 
not the case with particular verbs.

I am not sure that you agree in my conclusion, because you both seem to say 
that "This use of wayyiqtol is hendiadys", and that solves everything! I 
have no problems with the term hendiadys and neither with your 
interpretation of it, but the reason for your interpretation is your 
knowledge of the world (which is pragmatics), and in any case will a use of 
one wayyiqtol after another with a non-sequential meaning *definitely* show 
that sequentiality is not a semantic meaning of wayyiqtol.

Could both of you please confirm or deny the following proposition: 
"Sequentiality is not the semantic meaning of wayyiqtol."


Regards
Rolf


Rolf Furuli
Lecturer in Semitic languages
University of Oslo
<snip>