Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Paul Zellmer" <zellmer AT digitelone.com>]

Bryan,

I realize that I let a little time pass in responding to you, but I am
surprised that it's two weeks.  I hesitated responding immediately
because your post came in during one of my frequent bouts with
headaches.  Then, when the headaches subsided, I had a few other
ministry and personal items encroach on my study time (including
recovery from flipping a motorcycle).  But please do not interpret my
lack of response as a lack of interest.  However, because of the passage
of time, I hope the list members understand my thinking in not snipping
any of your last post.  Interested people may need to be reminded
exactly what was said.

I'm not quite sure I concur that Is 44:6-7 is distinct from 8b-ff.  It
looks to me like 6-8 is mixed to serve as a transition between the main
purpose of the larger hortatory discourse and the specific purpose of
the expository discourse.  The main purpose of the larger hortatory
looks to be part of the development of the thought begun in Is 40, which
runs to the end of the book--comfort for God's people even while they
are still undergoing hard times because of the promise that God would
eventually rescue them.  The specific development here is comfort
through the assurance that, despite the severity of the situation, God
was going revive the people to a blessed state.  The doubly reinforced
imperative of 8a is not furthering the hortatory; rather, it is echoing
again the imperative of verse 2.  And, surrounding 8a is the expository
that there is no other God.  It may not make for a nice diagram, but
does the theory not allow for an intermingling of thoughts and types at
transitional boundaries?  If it doesn't, then it isn't very realistic.

I agree with your statement, "Once I understand a text, I am not
interested in parsing it any longer (just 'busy work' then).  I want a
parse that aids accessing the text, ..."  However, in developing these
aids to be used in other texts, sometimes we need to continue parsing
after we understand first text.  How else do we see what clues were in
the first text that gave us the understanding that we ended up with?

(I did not intersperse any new thoughts in the quoted text, so those who
recall what was said before need not read on.)

Yours,

Paul

----- Original Message -----
From: Bryan Rocine <brocine AT earthlink.net>
To: Biblical Hebrew <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 1999 11:11 AM
Subject: Re: Expository discourse "profile"


> Hi Paul,
> you wrote:
> > Then, having clarified the definitions, the next step is
> to determine
> > the boundaries of the discourse under consideration,
> right?  Based on
> > the phrase KOH )FMAR YHWH, it appears as if the passage
> that Rolf
> > originally brought up is part of a discourse that goes
> from 44:6-23.  It
> > appears to be a "sub-argument" that is part of a larger
> passage starting
> > in 44:1.  The topic of the larger passage is the reviving
> of the
> > apparently dead or nearly dead Jacob/Israel, and the topic
> of the
> > passage under immediate consideration appears to be that
> YHWH alone is
> > God; there is no other.
> >
> > Does this jive with your perception of the discourse?
>
> It depends on how the segments relate both notionally (the
> text's coherence) and morpho-syntactically (the text's
> cohesion).
>
> In 44:1 we have a strong macro-syntactic signal `atah as
> well as the imperative shema` with its elaborate vocative
> and the formula koh 'amar yhvh with its elaborations of
> yhvh.  These three features, taken together, create a new
> beginning of a discourse in what seems to me a momentous
> flourish.  The main idea that follows is hortatory in
> nature: 'al tira' "fear not!"  V. 3's ki subordinates vv.
> 3-5 to the imperative 'al tira'.  We may consider vv. 3-5 a
> Predictive Narrative which is connected upwards in support
> of the imperative.  ki is used to create cohesiveness
> between the imperative and the following Predictive
> Narrative.  The Predictive Narrative coheres with the
> imperative in that it explains why Jacob need not fear.  The
> question at this point is whether a Hortatory Discourse,
> begun by 'al tira' of v. 2 has ended.  We may summarize the
> relationships between the segments schematically:
>
> __ v. 1 begin Hortatory Discourse: shema`
> |    v. 2 'al tira'
> |      __ v. 3 begin embedded Pred. Narr.
> |     |          *ki* 'etsaq
> |     |          'etsaq
> |     |      v. 4 vetsomxu
> |     |      v. 5 zeh yo'mar
> |     |           vezeh yiqra'
> |     |           vezeh yiktob
> |     |_____ubshem yisra'el yekaneh
> |
> ?
>
> In reading/hearing the text, I believe the question of
> whether the Hortatory Discourse is finished adds a bit of
> suspense or interest to the reading/listening experience.
> The use of the formula ko 'amar yhvh indicates a new
> segment, and the following verbless clauses seem to confirm
> a guess that the Hortatory Discourse has indeed ended and a
> new Expository Discourse has begun.  However, v. 8 repeats
> the exhortation of v. 2 doubly: 'al tipxadu ve'al tirhu
> "dread not! neither fear!"  Repetiton v. 2's exhortation
> creates a powerful coherence over the segments that we can't
> ignore.  We thereby realize that the Hortatory Discourse
> that began with v. 1 continues after all, and that the
> Expository Discourse of vv. 6-7  is embedded within the
> Hortatory, as with the previous embedded Predictive
> Narrative, to explain why Jacob should not fear.  Summary:
>
> __vv. 1-2 Hortatory Discourse begins
> |
> |    __vv. 3-5 Embedded Pred. Narr.
> |    |__
> |
> |    __vv. 6-7 Embedded Expository Disc.
> |    |__
> |
> |_v. 8a 'al tipxadu ve'al tirhu
> |
> ?
>
> Now we have this large Expository Discourse from v. 8b to
> 20.  Notice how it begins with a question hayesh 'eloah
> mibal`aday "Is there a god beside Me?"  Recall that
> Expository Discourse answers the question "What *is*?"  So
> here the discourse is actually introduced by a question of
> this very type.  Shall we consider this Expository Discourse
> to also be embedded within the Hortatory frame?  V. 21
> indicates we should in a number of ways.  Morphologically
> v.21 contains an imperative that carries on the Hortatory
> mainline.  Syntactically, we have 'eleh "these," which
> indicates a reference upwards to the idoloters.  And
> notionally, we have the references back to Jacob and `abdi
> "My servant" of v. 1.   I would say the Hortatory Discourse
> ends with v. 23.  V. 24 begins afresh with the formula ko
> 'amar yhvh and lacks any strong morpho-syntactical or
> notional ties upward.  Summary:
>
> __vv. 1-2 Hortatory Discourse begins
> |
> |    __vv. 3-5 Embedded Pred. Narr.
> |    |__
> |
> |    __vv. 6-7 Embedded Expository Disc.
> |    |__
> |
> |_v. 8a 'al tipxadu ve'al tirhu
> |
> |    _vv. 8b-23 Embedded Expository Disc.
> |    |___
> |___________Hortatory over
>
> Longacre and Dawson would not parse the text this way.  They
> use an arsenal of paragraph types (e.g. reason paragraph,
> comment paragraph, build up paragraph, etc.), which build up
> to make a discourse, rather than my way of using embedding
> and hosting of "sub"-discourses of various genres.  I find
> their use of paragraph to be unhelpful.  The reader has to
> understand the text *before* one can parse it (also den
> Exter Blokland's criticism of Longacre).  Once I understand
> a text, I am not interested in parsing it any longer (just
> "busy work" then.  I want a parse that aids accessing the
> text, and I think this model of embedding/hosting does just
> that.  Do you think its helpful?
>
> Shalom,
> Bryan
>
>
> B. M. Rocine
> Associate Pastor
> Living Word Church
> 6101 Court St. Rd.
> Syracuse, NY 13206
>
> (office) 315.437.6744
> (home) 315.479.8267
>
>
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