Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear Paul,



>Rolf Furuli wrote on Wednesday, July 21, 1999 5:07 PM

>> Take a look at 2 Samuel 17:12, which is a verse referring to the
>future. At
>> the beginning we find a WEQATAL with future (or modal) meaning. Then
>comes
>> the QATAL NIMCF which has modal (or future) meaning. What is
>interesting,
>> is that this verb occurs as a QATAL and not as a WEQATAL. Why? Because
>of
>> the relative particle  before it. If the WE of WEQATAL introduce a new
>> semantic element and changes the meaning of a normal QATAL (which
>commonly
>> is viewed as past) to a modal or future meaning, then we would hardly
>> expect that QATAL without this WE would have a modal or future
>meaning. But
>> this is the case here! And further, look at the words WELO-NOTAR. The
>last
>> element NOTAR is a QATAL  with future (or modal) meaning. And why does
>it
>> not occur as a WEQATAL? Because of the negative particle before it;
>the WE
>> , which we syntactically would expect, is connected with LO and not
>with
>> NOTAR.  The meaning of both QATALs (NIMCF and NOTAR) is exactly the
>same as
>> if they were expressed as WEQATALs without preceding particles. There
>are a
>> lot of such examples in the MT, and they show that the WE is a
>syntactic
>> element and not a semantic one. When you read your texts, look out for
>such
>> examples!
>>
>Uh, excuse me, Rolf, but in the case of NIMCF), I believe the Qal yiqtol
>1cp is homographic to the niphal qatal 3ms.  Since the weqatals that
>*are* found in this verse are 1cp, it is a definite possibility that we
>have a yiqtol in a dependent clause, which would be non-past relative to
>the reference time.

Your information is formally correct, but in my view it is impossible to
apply to 2 Samuel 17:12.  The antecedent of NIMCF is "him", something which
is seen from )ELAW, which occurs both before and after  NIMCF.

>
>I don't have an immediate thought on the WELO-NOTAR except that I *did*
>have to pull out my magnifying glass to make sure that it was a pathah
>under the tau and not a sere.  The sere would have indicated a qal
>participle, which would have been non-past, right?

The verb is YTR  and not NTR (which means "tremble", "leap") A passive form
of YTR fits the context but hardly a Qal participle of NTR.  So we still
have two QATALs with future meaning.
>
>> Let me add that a similar situation as the one described above also
>exists
>> for WAYYIQTOL. There are several examples (of which I plan to make a
>list)
>> where we have a narrative context where WAYYIQTOLs are expected, but
>where
>> we instead find a YIQTOL because a pronoun or a particle preceeds the
>verb.
>> This shows in a similar way that the WAYY is not a semantic element.
>One
>> example is 2 Samuel 17:17. Here we find three WEQATALs with past
>meaning
>> where WE clearly is syntactical (co-ordinating). Before the last one,
>we
>> find the verb HLK expressed as a YIQTOL. Why is it not expressed as a
>> WAYYIQTOL? Because of the preceding pronoun. The co-ordinating WAW is
>> connected with the pronoun, and if the pronoun were absent, we would
>> evidently have had  a WAYYIQTOL.  Please look out for examples of this
>> kind, also, when you read your texts!
>>
>Rolf, I can recall numerous postings pointing out that WAYYIQTOL
>normally pairs with X-QATAL and WEQATAL pairs with X-YIQTOL.  I believe
>you would find that, were the pronoun absent, we would evidently (based
>on evidence) find a WEQATAL.  We appear to be in a passage describing
>the normal recurrence of events, which is normally marked by a series of
>WEQATALs set in an historical passage.  Verse 18 breaks this description
>of the "normal" pattern, so we see the writer switch back to the
>WAYYIQTOL.

In any case, we have in 2 Samuel 17:17 a YIQTOL with past meaning,
describing an event which were terminated, and this YIQTOL can neither be
habitual or iterative. The point I tried to convey was that there are a lot
of similar examples where the "normal" pattern would give a WAYYIQTOL, but
where we find a YIQTOL with past meaning, because it is preceded by a
particle or a pronoun. In several such cases the waw is found before the
particle or pronoun. If a reasonable number of such examples can be found,
they would arue in favour of YIQTOL having the same semantic meaning as
WAYYIQTOL, and the WAYY-element just being a conjunction. So look out for
such examples.

>Just my thoughts,
>
>Paul


Regards
Rolf



Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo