Biblical Hebrew Forum

[yochanan bitan <ButhFam AT compuserve.com>]

> Is 6:1 as if the WAW  was nonexistent (as
>Randall suggests).

Please delete my name from this discussion thread as it is being
misquoted/misapplied. It does not represent what I was saying.

Hebrew vav is vav. Period. 
(anything else is "very poorly stated"[RB]. Apparently that wasn't subtle
enough.)

Can vayyiqtol follow an adverbial? Yes. As my examples showed. Quite
nicely,  too. And that is all they intended. 

(Rolf's question ['non-conjunctive vav'] is raising an illusion from
outside the language, "poorly stated".  "language" = Hebrew, biblical
dialect, not modern, not German, not English, etc.) 

Vav in vayyiqtol is vav and yiqtol is like any other VAYYIQTOL: together
they introduce an on-line 'definite' TAM. 
and of course, while the semantics of vav is still vav, 
the TAM of a veyiqtol is 'indefinite', which does not apply to Isaiah 6.1.
(sorry, Rolf, but that is how MT bHebrew works.)

Isaiah 6.1, the event "I saw the Lord" is a focal, 'on line' thematic'
event. 
It is not a subordiated relative: "**It was year X when I saw the Lord" (**
means 'not correct, it misses the pragmatics')

You want the pramatics? 
OK:
"In the year that king Uzzia died something important happened. I saw the
L-rd."

That was for free. If you see it and can use it fine. If you want details
or want to fight it, then you'll have to wait for the book. 

blessings
Randall Buth, PhD
Jerusalem