Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Kimmo Huovila <kimmo.huovila AT helsinki.fi>]

Alviero Niccacci wrote:
> However, i would not speak of discourse analysis as "a plausible 
> alternative"
> to Documentary hypothesis simply because they pursue different goals.

I completely agree. All I meant is that DA may give an alternative
analysis to explain a feature of the text that has been used as a basis
for source division. See the example below.

Liz Fried wrote:

> > (KH) I am not trying to argue against (or for) DH. Just noting that 
> > sometimes
> > DA gives a plausible alternative.
> Can you please give an example to one who is unfamiliar with DA?

To answer your question I cut and paste from another e-mail I wrote.

Kimmo Huovila wrote:

> To get a sense of what I meant, take for example Collins' article* on
> wayyiqtol as pluperfect (which incidentally deals with one detail of the
> two creation stories - but only as it relates to the pluperfect
> wayyiqtol).
> 
> He criticises Buth's previous article as Buth says that the wayyiqtol in
> 2:19 is out of sequence with Gen 1 and thus indicates a different
> source. Collins' view is that it is an example of a wayyiqtol
> pluperfect.
> 
> I think that Collins' article is linguistically sound. That does not
> mean much about the source division of Genesis. But it does mean (if he
> is right) that the pluperfect form is not quite good an argument to
> indicate a different source. But the very verbal form has been used to
> argue for a different source. Regardless of other possible arguments for
> the source division, this argument does not hold. This is where I feel a
> good grasp of text linguistics would have made a difference in terms of
> this particular argument.
> 
> *Collins, C. John. The Wayyiqtol as 'Pluperfect': When and Why. Tyndale
> Bulletin, Volume 46.1 May 1995, pp. 117-140.

Kimmo