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  • From: peter_kirk AT sil.org
  • To: <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: (long) Re[3]: WAW the conjunction
  • Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 20:10:46 -0500


I was glad to see that Rolf did also send his reply to the list,
though separately so that I did not receive that copy until later. I
am glad he has made public his praise of Alviero Niccacci, and I
withdraw any suggestion in my reply below that he is saying one thing
in public and another in private. Nevertheless, this praise still
seems a strange contrast to the criticism he wrote in his reply to
Alviero.

Here is my reply to Rolf.

Peter Kirk


______________________________ Forward Header
__________________________________
Subject: Re: (long) Re[3]: WAW the conjunction
Author: Peter Kirk at IPOIP
Date: 11/01/2000 22:54


Dear Rolf,

Thank you for your long reply. I was sorry to see that you sent it
only to me, as I think some of it may well be of wider interest to the
list. I hope you may now be able to correct this. See some further
comments below.

I was actually rather surprised at how far I was able to agree with
you. My real disagreement comes only close to the end, when you imply
that WAYYIQTOL is imperfective according to your definitions. I just
don't see how this can possibly hold water. I would have expected you
to conclude at this stage that (despite the uncertainties of
morphology and Masoretic vocalisation etc) YIQTOL and WAYYIQTOL are
actually two different verb forms, imperfective and perfective
respectively. That is certainly the conclusion I have reached from
this study.

Peter Kirk

----------------

<snip>

Dear Peter,


Thank you for accepting my challange. Looking at your table and your
explanation of it, your definition seems to exclude tense and be
wholly
aspectual (as you yourself imply, position in the clause is just an
observation, not a definition of meaning). You also show that your
definition of aspect is different from Comrie's and similar to Broman
Olses's definition. That is, you say that the perfective aspect
(encompassing QATAL and WAYYIQTOL) is not only "complete" but also
"completed", and the imperfective aspect (encompassing long and short
YIQTOL, WEQATAL, and WEYIQTOL) is not completed. Modality (not
indicative)
is associated with the imperfective aspect. In my eyes your definition
is
quite clear.

PK: Thank you for your comments. I am not sure that I would want to
push any distinction between "complete" and "completed", which are
very close to being synonymous in this context. Even if Comrie and/or
Broman Olsen have defined them in ways to make a distinction between
them, you should not read into my meaning any definitions of
"completed" other than the common English meaning.

As for my approach to Hebrew, I will give a *sketch* of it below. I
started
without any linguistic presuppositions regarding Hebrew (at least I
tried
to do that; we all have our presuppositions).
What I wanted, was to "measure" the Hebrew verbal system in light of
the
principal traits of language in general, namely tense, mood, and
aspect
(TAM). To achieve that I needed a method by which the "semantic" parts
of
the TAM-structure could be singled out, and I found such a method by
help
of the work of Mari Broman Olsen. Any model of the verbal system of a
dead
language will entail some circularity, because some assumptions must
be
made along the way; but it is important to find a model that reduces
circularity as much as possible.

You mentioned that you had some problems with understanding my
fundament,
and I will express the difference between "semantic meaning" and
"conversational pragmatic implicature" with the principle of H.P.
Grice:
"Semantic meanings may not be canceled without contradiction or
reinforced
without redundancy". Broman Olsen illustrates the point by following
example:

(1) (a) Elsie plodded along,#but not slowly.

(b) Elsie plodded along,#?slowly.

(2) (a) Margaret plodded along, although she wasn't tired.

(b) Margaret plodded along, she was very tired.

Her point is that "tiredness" is associated with plod by
conversational
pragmatic implicature (it can be canceled), while "slowly" is a part
of the
semantic meaning of "plod",i.e. "slowly" can under no circumstances be
separated from "plod".

PK: Thank you for clarifying this. Although I see a distinction in
this case (but I find (1b) acceptable, even normal), I feel that you
are making too great a leap in extrapolating this distinction into a
major theoretical division which is necessarily applicable to every
language. I will also repeat my question: how can we distinguish
between these two, even in principle, in a dead language?

<snip - noted but no special comment>

(a) To find out whether tense is the semantic meaning of any of the
verb
forms, what I had to do, was to look at all the examples of the form
and
find out whether RT (reference time) and C (the deictic point) always
had
the same relationship (RT>C - past tense), (RT=C - present tense), and
(C>RT -future tense). Textual criticism had to be taken into account,
as
well as a diachronic study, and special uses of the verb forms (such
as
hypothetical conditional clauses) had to be taken into account, and
also a
reasonable number of exceptions had to be accepted. But the numbers
below
seem to say clearly that tense is not a semantic part of the verbal
system
of Classical Hebrew.

The 836 examples (6,4%) of QATALs with future meaning, and the 1372
examples (10.5%) of QATAL with present meaning excludes that QATAL is
a
past tense.
The 357 examples (5,8%) of WEQATALs with past meaning shows it is no
future
tense
Regarding WEQATAL, YIQTOL, and WAYYIQTOL I have not completed my
research,
but about 5% of the YIQTOLs have past meaning, excluding it from being
present or future tense. Between 5 and 10% of the WAYYIQTOLs have
non-past
meaning which would exclude it from being past tense.

PK: I agree with you on this one, that (at least on your definition)
Hebrew verb forms do not code tense.

b) To find out whether one of the verbal groups coded for modality
while
others did not, it was necessary to see if subjunctive could be
expressed
by all the groups, and my finds were positive. All agree that YIQTOL,
WEYIQTOL, and WEQATAL can express subjunctive, and there are several
examples of QATAL and WAYYIQTOL that have modal characteristics as
well.
Therefore I have drawn the conclusion that no particular verb form
codes
for modality.

PK: Basically I agree with you. But I wonder if you have missed
something by not making the distinctions between long and short YIQTOL
(although I know that this distinction is not always made consistently
even in those verbs in which it can be shown) and between
sentence-initial and non-sentence initial YIQTOL. It could be suggested
that sentence-initial YIQTOL is (almost) always modal, whereas
non-sentence-initial YIQTOL is not (or rarely so). Would your approach
allow for that distinction?

c) Because two members of TAM was excluded as representing semantic
meaning
in Hebrew, only the third remained, namely aspect. Even though the TAM
system is quite universal, neither of the members need to be present
in
Hebrew, but when two was excluded, a logical step was to test the
system
for the third member, namely aspectuality.
Aspect has something in common with mood, and there are different
definitions of aspect. There is, however, a common denominator between
the
differing viewpoints which can be expressed in three points:
(1) Aspect is a subjective viewpoint; i.e. it shows how the reporter
chooses to report an event.
(2) Aspect somehow makes visible or accentuates, either a part (the
imperfective aspect) or the whole (the perfective aspect) of event
time
(the non-deictic time it takes to complete an event,from the beginning
to
the end).
(3) The beginning and/or the end of an event is important for
distinguishing between the imperfective and the perfective aspect.

If we start with QATAL and YIQTOL, it seems that all three points are
compatible with their use. The subjectivity of (1) is seen in the fact
that
the same event can be described both by a QATAL and a YIQTOL without
any
visible difference in meaning. Aspect is non-deictic and YIQTOL and
QATAL
can be used for past, present and future, and the fact that
semelfactive
and telic verbs expressed as YIQTOLs make the action iterative,
habitual,
or frequentative, while QATALs do not have this effect, is both
compatible
with (2) and suggests that YIQTOL has imperfective characteristics and
QATAL has perfective characteristics. The end of an event evidently
has
some importance, because most QATALs include it while most YIQTOLs do
not.
Based on these observations I see a basic similarity between YIQTOL
and
QATAL and the general definition of aspects, so I proceded with the
view
that one of the TAM members exists in Hebrew, namely, aspect. (Past,
present, and future meaning can of course be expressed, and
subjunctive as
well, but not by morphosyntactic means, except possibly by the ekstra
long
and short YIQTOL.)

PK: I think that I agree with you in this as well.

A very important question would then be: Can we find any semantic
(uncancelable) property in YIQTOL and QATAL? In the English aspectual
model
of Broman Olsen we have such properties. The perfective aspect shows
definitely that an event has ended at C (the deictic point) while the
imperfective aspect shows definitely that it has not ended. This
inticates
that the two aspects are different ways of viewing (or presenting) the
internal time of an event, as Comrie defines them.
To test YIQTOL and QATAL for this, we can make the following
prediction.
If there is a semantic difference between YIQTOL and QATAL as it is
between
the English imperfective and perfective asopect, we expect to find
that
YIQTOLs *only* are used with events and states that are not terminated
at
C, and that QATAL is used for events and states that are terminated. A
test
shows that the prediction holds in many, but far from all cases.
(Alviero
is right when he says that the verbs do not describe the events as
they
objectively are, but only the way the reporter chooses to depict
them.)

PK: Now I am confused: I thought that in Broman Olsen's model aspect
was to do with the relationship between ET and RT, and was independent
of the relationship between RT and C which is the domain of tense. Thus
the definition I was working on was more like "The perfective aspect
shows definitely that an event has ended at RT (the reference time)
while the imperfective aspect shows definitely that it has not ended".

<snip to save bandwidth, though this is very important stuff>

The most narrow generalisation that accounts for all these
observations
associated with YIQTOL and QATAL is one centered around distance and
scope, and this is my definition of aspect:

THE PERFECTIVE ASPECT REPRESENTS A BROAD VIEW FROM SOME DISTANCE WHERE
THE
WHOLE SITUATION OR A GREAT PART OF IT IS FOCUSED UPON. THE
IMPERFECTIVE
ASPECT REPRESENTS A CLOSEUP VIEW OF A SMALL PART OF THE SITUATION
WITH
DETAILS VISIBLE.

For the most part the narrow scope is directed toward a part of the
situation *before* the end, but it can also include the end, as it
does in
the resultative and factitive situations in the Piel binyan (but in
such
cases we can still say the aspect is "open" because the end of the
resulting state is not reached). For the most part the broad scope
includes
the end, but there are many instances where the situation continues
after
it is presented by the perfective aspect.

How useful is such a definition? When a definition is not semantic,
there
is always the danger that it can be too vague and therefore be
useless. On
the other hand, we cannot make a definition that is more definite than
the
data. So perhaps we need to do some reflection. While I view the model
of
Alviero as completely circular as far as the *meaning* of the verb
forms is
concerned, I find its description of the *use* of the different forms
extremely valuable. Alviero has done a descriptive work that deserves
admiration. I think that a study of the use of the different forms to
a
great degree can compensate for the lack of *semantic* meaning of
YIQTOL
and QATAL. Exactly the same is true regarding modality, a lack of
semantic
meaning is compensated by a description of use.

PK: Interesting, you are coming close to what I was accusing you of in
my comments on yours to Prof. Niccacci (which I wrote before reading
this one). That is, you are accepting that you cannot find any
semantic distinguishing factors between Hebrew verb forms (though not,
as I was suggesting, that this is impossible in principle), and
agreeing that a study based on pragmatics rather than semantics is
helpful. But it does seem rather odd to me that you are publicly
(on-list) criticising Prof. Niccacci for taking this approach while on
the same day privately (off-list to me) calling his approach
"extremely valuable" and proposing to do something similar yourself. I
don't think he even claimed that he was describing the *meaning" of
verb forms rather than their *use*, which makes your accusations of
circularity baseless.

<snip - a useful analogy>

Apart from situations where particular properties are signaled, the
two
aspects can in principle be used for any situation. YIQTOL and QATAL
are
used with past, present, and future meaning, and with indicative and
subjunctive force. But looking at the MT landscape, there are
particular
patters that lead most workers to see four or five different
conjugations
and not just two. As I see it, this is a wrong view, which is
inherited
from the "fathers" right back to the Middle ages, and it is based on a
misunderstanding of the use and function of the conjunction WAW, and
on the
lack of a distinction between semantic and pragmatic factors...

PK: I don't think it is very fair to criticise medieval fathers, or
for that matter modern scholars such as Prof. Niccacci, for not making
the exact distinction made in the linguistic theory to which you hold.

RF:... What then, do
the patterns represent? The same that is the reason for the pattern of
infinitives and participles, namely, on linguistic convention. Several
grammars view YIQTOL and WEQATAL on the one hand, and QATAL and
WAYYIQTOL
as similar, or quite similar in meaning, The reason is a similar use,
and
that is true. But this need not be explained as a converting force of
WE-
and WAYY- or that these prefixes signal an opposite meaning from the
forms
without prefixes. Given my definition of aspects, the reason for the
use of
QATAL and WAYYIQTOL in past contexts and YIQTOL and QATAL in future
contexts, can be that both aspects can be used in these "unmarked"
situations without any problems of meaning. And the reason why past
contexts start with QATAL and continues with WAW+YIQTOL while future
contexts starts with YIQTOL and continues with WAW+QATAL can be
explained
as convention, a way to order the parts of speech in a language
lacking
tenses but having aspects. The use of YIQTOL with past meaning and
QATAL
with future meaning can be explained by discourse function, word
order,
genre (e.f. many QATALs with future meaning in prophetic texts) and
foreground, background etc.
(Even when persens have defined four (or five) conjugations solely on
the
basis of aspect, tense has been lurking in the background. One good
advice
for those working to find the number of conjugations, is to look at
the
role *tense* (and I mean "tense", not "time") plays in one's model.
Either
it should be discarded completely if one thinks it is absent in
Hebrew, or
one should allways keep in mind the influence it has on the
conclusions if
it is used. The way in-between, when one uses tense without admitting
it or
being conscious of it, is very common - and dangerous.)

PK: My objection to your claimed identity between YIQTOL and WAYYIQTOL
is not based on tense (for both can be past, present or future) but on
aspect. You have described YIQTOL as imperfective in the sense that
"THE IMPERFECTIVE ASPECT REPRESENTS A CLOSEUP VIEW OF A SMALL PART OF
THE SITUATION WITH DETAILS VISIBLE", and that is a definition within
which I can work. But I do not see any way in which WAYYIQTOL, in its
most common occurrences within narrative, can be described as
imperfective according to this definition. In a great many cases
events descibed with WAYYIQTOL take place in a quick series viewed at
a distance with no details visible. For example, consider the very
common WAYYAMOT "and he died" (or perhaps "and he will die"). This is
rarely if ever accompanied by a description of the process or means of
dying or with any event that took place while the person was at the
point of death. It is often part of a chain of WAYYIQTOLs, generally
preceded by an event which took place during the person's life and
followed by an event which certainly took place after he was dead e.g.
his burial. This is a classic example of perfective aspect, or at the
very least of neutral or undefined aspect, and I think I am basing my
objections not on "English" aspect but on your definition of aspect in
Hebrew. Do you really consider WAYYAMOT in such instances to be
imperfective, and how can you justify that?

I will like to repeat that the description above is just a sketch, and
many
questions remain to be answered. The two most pressing questions
regarding
the model is:

(1) How can imperfective forms be the basic forms bringing the action
forwards in past narrative? Answer:The argument against this is based
upon
the "English" aspect where aspect describes event time in an objective
way.
Hebrew aspect is different. The prefix form is used for narrative in
Aramaic and Ugaritic as well.

PK: I think I have answered this above, except for the last sentence
which is of doubtful relevance.

(2) How can WAYYIQTOL be viewed as identical with YIQTOL when it is so
different in form? Answer: In unpointed texts the difference is
minimal and
it is not demonstrated any morphological difference before the
Masoretes.
Nobody has ever conclusively demonstrated that the WAYY-element change
the
meaning of the following YIQTOL. It need not have any semantic
meaning.

PK: I think Henry Churchyard has sufficiently conclusively
demonstrated that the WAYYIQTOL cannot be a simple compound of the
conjunction WE- and the long form YIQTOL, and others have demonstrated
that in cognate langauges (which you have juse appealed to yourself!)
there are two different prefix forms. But no, no-one, including
yourself apparently, has been able to demonstrate that anything in
Hebrew has any semantic meaning by your definitions, so they can
hardly be expected to have demonstrated it in this instance.


Regards
Rolf



Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo





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