Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Shoshanna Walker <rosewalk AT concentric.net>]

> How about "I am becomming what I am becomming"?


How about Rashi's explanation?

Shoshanna



> Good explanation, Uri.
>
> It was explained to me that the ancient Semite experienced
> life as though a rower on a row-boat. He sees the past
> perfectly; the present (if he turns his head) is past/has passed in an
> eye-blink. The future he sees not at all.
> Thus, we have a perfect tense for the past,
> and an imperfect one for everything else.
>
> Liz Fried
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: uri hurwitz [mailto:uhurwitz AT yahoo.com]
> > Sent: Wednesday, May 02, 2001 12:16 PM
> > To: Biblical Hebrew
> > Subject: Re: I AM
> >
> >
> >
> >     Shoshana, what is in  modern Hebrew the future, e.g. ehyeh, had a
> > totally different sense in biblical usage: it was the "imperfect", that is
> > an action that was not concluded ( as against the "perfect" which refers
> > to the past. Both of these senses can be further refined as you may have
> > seen in recent exchanges on this list)
> >      Thus imprecise as it is, the only possible translation of Ehyeh asher
> > Ehyeh
> >  is: I am/will be whoever I am/will be.
> >     Uri Hurwitz
> >
> > ---
> > You are currently subscribed to b-hebrew as: [lizfried AT umich.edu]
> > To unsubscribe, forward this message to
> > $subst('Email.Unsub')
> > To subscribe, send an email to join-b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu.
> >
>
>
> ---
> You are currently subscribed to b-hebrew as: [rosewalk AT concentric.net]
> To unsubscribe, forward this message to 
> $subst('Email.Unsub')
> To subscribe, send an email to join-b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu.