Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Niels Peter Lemche <npl AT teol.ku.dk>]

A preliminary review of Mesha, Siloam, Lachish and Mesad Hashawyahu gave
some interesting information.

Mesha: l. 3, w'´sh ... could be an example as the examples in ll. 7 (v'r'),
l. 9 (v'bn) and l. 10 (vybn).
The syntax of ll.4-5-6 is interesting: ´mry . mlk . isr'l . wy´nw . 't.m'b .
ymn . rbn . ky . y'np . kmsh . b'rtsh . wychlph . bnh . wy'mr . gm .
h'...Omri (was) king of Israel, and he oppressed Moab for a long time,
because Kemosh was angry on his land, and his son followed him, and he said:
also I. The verb i l. 5, wy´nw, is probably a consecutive form following in
this case a nominal sentence, then the ky-sentence intrudes, and after that
comes in l. 6 another w-consecutive sentence, but is this a case of the use
of consequitives in biblical Hebrew because what governs the imperfects
wychlph and wy'mr? 

Otherwise for language, Mesha still has the absolute -t endings to the
feminine, as bmt . z't in l. 3. Also a plural masc. Ending in -n instead of
-m, in ymn rbn.

Siloam: l. 2 has according to Gibson a consecutive form, but it is all in a
lacuna and cannot be used. Both Doner and Renger reconstructs the line 2 and
3 differently. But the best ever example of a consecutive form that follows
the rules of biblical Hebrew is l. 4, 'and the waters went' wylkw following
the perfect hkw at the beginning of the line.

Lachish, almost nothing was found of interest, except No 4, l. 6/7 where
there is an example that would fit. l. 9-10 is a dubious case because of the
lacunas. 

The surprise (to me-and I have to confess and admit my ignorance) is Metsad
Hashawyahu, where there are three cases of consecutive forms, ll. 4/5 (one)
and l. 7/8 (two cases).

So where or not I like it, there are cases of consecutive imperfects in Iron
Age Moabite and Judaean Hebrew, but so far i haven't seen any cases of
consecutive perfects but would like to know whether any here knows about
such cases. I haven't had the time to study the Arad texts today.

NPL