Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Dave Washburn" <dwashbur AT nyx.net>]

Friends,
I want to pick up this thread a little bit.  I seems to have stopped 
about a month ago, and I apologize for taking so long to get to it (I 
also won't inflict the godawful list of reasons for delay on anyone).  
However, I would like to make a couple of comments on the qatal 
form etc.

[snip]
> But when this development occurred (i.e. wayyiqtol being
> > reserved for past, yiqtol for future/habitual), it seems
> to me there would be a vacuum
> > that qatal would irresistably get sucked into.  I.e. how
> many languages are there
> > where you can say "and he did" (wayya`as) but you can't
> say simply "he did" (isn't
> > this what your model is saying?), or "he did not do" (do
> you disagree that lo' qatal
> > is the negative of wayyiqtol?).
> 
> I agree that the attributive qatal is quite compatible with
> past since the subject's coming into this state does most
> often takes place prior to the speaker's time, i.e. int he
> past.  And clearly, the qatal does ultimately evolve into a
> past.  However, there are so many uses of the qatal in a
> non-past reference in the Tanakh, the evolution from an
> essentially attributive form into a past form does not seem
> to have occurred yet at the time of the Tanakh's being
> written.  As for your good question about "AND he did"
> versus "he did":  I think vayya`as says them both.  `asah
> says something different.  In other words, the vav plus
> gemination of the wayyiqtol is more of a signal than and
> lexical "and."  

Agreed, as is well known.  

I do not think that lo' qatal is the
> negative of wayyiqtol, at least not generally.  I would say
> that a negated proposition represents the irreal world
> rather than the real as a wayyiqtol represents.   Although I
> do not deny that a negated qatal can sometimes represent an
> event on the mainline, I generally consider the construction
> as irrealis and off-the-line and "stative."

I've seen you mention this before, and it has possibilities.  I'd be 
interested to hear more development about it.  Specifically, working 
from Galia Hatav's definition of modality, how does this irrealis 
compare to/differ from other types of modality?

> > Some other questions that occur to me up in thinking of
> qatal as only an attributive
> > (all asked with an open mind):
> > To go back to Gen 1:5 - are all the translations since LXX
> which use the same verb
> > form to translate both wayyira' and qara' (i.e. probably
> all translations except yours
> > and Young's so-called literal translation) wrong?
> 
> What kind of iconoclast do you imagine me to be?  ;-)

:-)  I think the use of chiasmus in Gen 1:5 is pretty clear, and 
following F. I. Andersen in "The Sentence in Biblical Hebrew" I 
understand chiasmus to be a way of drawing two events/situations 
into a single focus and viewing them as two sides of the same 
coin.  Thus I would see the force of these clauses as something 
along the lines of "God named them both: he called the light 'day' 
and the darkness 'night'."  Poor translation technique, I know, but 
I'm going for clarity rather than literalness.


> The translations are terrific!
> Seriously.  But they're not Hebrew.  Are we learning Hebrew
> when we can translate the Tanakh precisely as our favorite
> translators already have?  Hope not.  Why are we are
> taking all this time, effort and expense to learn BH?  One
> reason for me is, if possible, to
> access and talk about those nuances of BH which
> may be difficult to signify in English or another target
> language.  

Yes.  Here I see a crucial difference between translation and 
exegesis.  The former strives for something readable, accessible to 
as wide an audience as possible (or at least that is the usual goal); 
the latter seeks to understand and explain a broader range of 
issues such as lexical or grammatical nuances, author's intent, 
and all the rest.  Each must sacrifice something: translators must 
sacrifice depth of exegesis, exegesis must often sacrifice 
readability.  But hey, everything in life is a trade-off.

instance, I think there is a difference in
> meaning between a wayyiqtol and a qatal, as I have
> explained, but it is rarely captured in English.  I often
> use this "-er" translation of the qatal to try to capture
> its meaning
> as an attribution.  I admit the attempt is somewhat feeble,
> but the good thing about it is that it reminds us that the
> qatal is different than the wayyiqtol.  I think it
> encourages us to stop and appreciate that English is not BH
> and BH is not English.

Good point.  It's a pity English doesn't have a better way to 
express this idea.  

> Another point:  The traditions for how to translate the BH
> forms into English were already so firmly entrenched in the
> tradition created by the revered English (and other)
> translations by the time comparative Semitics and modern
> linguistics come on the scene, that we can hardly claim that
> comparative Semitics or modern linguistics are allowed to
> have a really unhampered
> effect on *how* to translate BH.  What do you think?

I've run into the same thing in some of my Greek exegesis.  When I 
presented my approach to Eph 5:18 back in 1983 at an ETS 
meeting, everyone agreed that it probably wouldn't catch on 
because we were bucking 500 years of tradition.  For a "modern" 
linguist, that can be quite frustrating.  The only way I can think of to 
overcome this problem is to keep hacking away at it until it sinks 
in, but I doubt that's the most effective approach.  Does anybody 
have a better idea?

> > If qatal is attributive, why would it necessarily be
> durative - i.e. why couldn't
> > *rats* mean "he was one that ran" rather than "he was a
> runner" (the first doesn't
> > sound much different from a simple past tense)?
> 
> I'm taking your question as being about translating the
> qatal.  I think I mentioned before that an English "-er"
> word does not necessarily express habit or repetitive
> action.  One only needs to commit a single crime to be
> rightly called a criminal.  So Cain was a murderER having
> killed once, his righteous brother.  On the other hand, the
> English '-er' word is (to say the least) quite compatible
> with a
> habitual or repetitive sense as, I think, is also the BH
> qatal when used in its gnomic sense.  BTW, I think "he was
> the one that ran" gives a fair sense for Hebrew *rats*, but
> your use of a cleft construction presents another problem
> within the pragmatic frameworks of BH vs. English.  If the H
> had been *hu' rats*, I might be even more inclined to accept
> your translation.

So the only thing that determines whether it's one-shot or habitual 
is context and semantics.  Correct?

> > Is qatal redundant with hayah plus participle (eg Deut
> 9:22, 24)?  Are there places
> > where qatal can be shown to be the equivalent of hayah
> plus participle?

To John: I'm not sure I understand this question.  I realize it's been 
a while, but if you're so inclined could you develop it a little more for 
my slower mind?

> > How does hayah get translated as an attributive?  Qatal
> statives?
> 
> I do not view hyh as a mere copulative.  It is closer to
> Greek GINOMAI than EIMI.  So hyh is only "quasi stative" as
> a root.
> I have trouble translating qatal of hyh.  I often use "had
> become" and often settle for the English copulative.

So the famous was/became problem in Gen 1:2 would seem to 
deepen under this analysis?  I'm not sure I follow this.  At least by 
NT times, GINOMAI often has the same force as EIMI, and the 
only determiner is context.  Do you take the same view of HYH?

> Qatal statives:  I express them a couple ways, most often as
> predicate adjectives, e.g.
> qatal: qatonti  "I am (was) small."
> wayyiqtol: va'eqtan  "I became small (as in disrespected)."
> 
> The stative root 'hb is a little different:
> qatal:  veyisra'el 'ahav 'et yoseph
> "and Israel was a lover of Joseph," or
> "it was Israel who was a lover of Joseph"
> wayyiqtol:   veye'ehab 'isha benaxal soreq
> "then he [Samson] fell in love with a woman of Wadi Soreq."

I would argue that "then" is expressed by the previous clause 
"way:hiy )axarey ken" but that's peripheral.  I wonder how much of 
the "fell in love" force is contained in the verb form and how much is 
in the temporal clause preceding it, and how much is in the 
pragmatic context.  It strikes me that they all seem to be working 
together to produce this force.  What do you think?

> There are lots of ways to express stativity in BH.  Some
> roots are stative.  We don't always need an "-er" word to
> express stative roots as attributions as shown above because
> the corresponding English is also "stative" attributive.
> The "passive" stems often have a stative or attributive
> sense.  Niphal
> qatal of mts':  nimtsa'
> "he is (was, had been) found."
> Niphal wayyiqtol:  vayyimmatse'
> "then he was found"

I confess I don't see the difference here.  Aside from the idea of 
sequentiality, which is also peripheral at the moment, the two 
senses look alike to me.  Can you offer some biblical examples of 
the two where contexts can illuminate the difference?

> So again, the English passive expression is attributive, so
> we don't need the "-er" word.  The distinction between
> the qatal and wayyiqtol is perfect and past perfecTIVE,
> respectively, the two of which sometimes translate
> equivalently in English.

Again, I'm not sure I follow the difference.

Dave Washburn
http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur
A Bible that's falling apart means a life that isn't.