Biblical Hebrew Forum

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 On  05/27/99 (1 Sam 9.5) Matthew Anstey wrote:


> Dear listmembers,
> 
> In their recent grammar "A Biblical Hebrew Reference Grammar"
> (§36.1.I.3.iv), van der Merwe et al claim that independent personal pronouns
> (ipps) can function in "a specific type of temporal construction" to
> indicate "simultaneous (or nearly simultaneous) actions". This use is an
> example of an "apparently superfluous pronoun" being used for
> "topicalistion". They give1 Sam 9.5 (and 1kings 1.14) as an example:
> 
> 	hemmah	ba'u		be'erets		tsuf
> 	When		they.came	to.the.land	of.Suph
> 
> 	wesha'ul	'amar 		lena`aro
> 	Saul		said		to.his.servant
> 
> 
> I can't find any reference to this understanding of the temporal use of ipps
> in W&O or elsewhere. They footnote the section to Naude's 1996 unpublished
> dissertation on ipps in Qumran Hebrew.
> 
> My question is whether anyone else has written about this temporal use of
> ipps and whether you think this is a valid understanding. If hemmah in 1 Sam
> 9.5 does not indicate the temporal clause, what does, and does hemmah
> topicalise in some other way in that case, or is it in fact not topicalising
> at all?
> 


Dear Matthew Anstey,

Cases similar to 1 Sam 9:5 are Gen 44:4 and Judg 18:22. In Josh 2:8 the yiqtol is conditioned by the presence of *Terem* (not yet).
The construction x-qatal is also attested with a noun (common or proper) instead of the independent personal pronoun as the X element; see *habboqer 'ôr* (when it was daylight) in Gen 44:3, or *habboqer hayâ* (when it was day) in Exod 10:13.
This means that this function ("temporal construction") is not a property of the independent personal pronoun. IMO it is rather a property of a verb-second construction. A sentence having a finite verb in the second position plays offline functions in historical narrative, and the "when" function is one of them. See my _Syntax_ #105.
This "temporal" function is also attested with a participle instead of qatal; see  Gen 29:9 and other examples in my _Syntax_ #100. The participle highlights contemporaneity with the following main sentence.

The same pattern--"temporal"  sentence, or circumstance, followed by main sentence--is also attested to convey a condition, a cause, or a comparison. The circumstance can be called protasis, the main sentence apodosis.
This pattern protasis + apodosis is also attested preceded by appropriate conjunctions, such as *kî, 'im, ka'a$er*.

In narrative, the different types of protasis + apodosis (both with and without conjunctions) can be preceded *wayehî*. See examples in my _Syntax_ #112. In this case the construction protasis + apodosis is connected with the narrative mainline; without *wayehî* it signals a break in the mainline.

In direct speech, the different types of protasis + apodosis can be introduced by *wehayâ*.

Peace and all good.
Alviero Niccacci 
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