Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Trevor Peterson <06PETERSON AT cua.edu>]

>===== Original Message From Polycarp66 AT aol.com =====
>You had me a bit puzzled regarding your citation of Hos 13.14 (twice).
>HfYfH does not appear in this passage.  What you have done is to confuse
>it with ):eHiY [which also has the forms )"Y and )"Y."H] meaning "where"
>with the verb HfYfH.  In Ex 3.12 and 4.15 you have the "imperfect" form
>whereas Ex 6.7 the form is "perfect".

This may be somewhat overstated. Aside from the three instances in this 
chapter, the other two forms you note (and their compounds) are the only 
forms 
we expect to see meaning "where." If we had one of those forms, there would 
be 
no question. As it is, we have a form that looks exactly like a first person 
jussive from HYH in the G stem. BDB's argument is that several ancient 
versions translate it as where, and what the word looks like seems unlikely. 
(We don't expect a jussive in the first person, nor does it make as much 
sense 
in this context.) I'm always a little bit hesitant about arguing such things 
on the basis of what does and does not seem to fit best in a given context, 
but I do think the problem with the jussive form needs to be addressed. 
That's 
why, as I said in my earlier post, I'd be more inclined to consider this an 
old preterite form, although that doesn't fit very well either. The solution 
proposed by BDB is to treat this word as some sort of otherwise unattested 
alternate form of the interrogative. The solution proposed by HALOT and BHS 
is 
to consider it a textually corrupted form of the interrogative.
>
>[watts-westmaas] Hello, Sorry I really do not understand why then it is
>translated as 'I WILL BE' in Hosea?  the eHiY was what I was talking
>about but where does the 'WHERE' fit in all this?

Check some other translations. The KJV follows what BDB (at the turn of the 
last century!) calls an "older" interpretation. Many later translations, 
including the NASB, read differently.
>
>
>
>Hos 13.14
>
>MiYaD $:)oWL )eP:D."M MiM.fWeT )eG)fL"M ):eHiY D:BfYeYKf MfWeT ):eHiY
>Qf+fB:Kf $:)oWL NoXaM YiS.T"R M"("YNfY
>
>Shall I redeem them from the power of Sheol?
>Shall I redeem them from Mot?
>Where is your plague Mot?
>Where is your destruction Sheol?
>Repentence is hidden from my eyes.

This is a situation where I think it would be good to consider various 
translations. Providing one translation, whether it's your own or some other, 
uncredited translation, only reiterates the point already made. What I think 
needs to be made clear is that different translations handle this verse 
differently, depending (in part) on how they understand the form ehiy. (There 
also happens to be a problem with another word, but that's another issue.)

The bottom line is that the form can be a short prefixal conjugation from HYH 
(jussive or preterite), but that doesn't seem to be what several ancient 
versions thought, nor does it make a great deal of sense in this context. So 
although some older translations followed what the form looks like, several 
later translations have gone with the reading of the ancient versions, 
suggesting that they were reading a different text or that this is an 
alternate form of the interrogative meaning "where?" Whatever we may say 
about 
the issue, I think there's good reason to avoid this chapter when the 
question, as started this thread, is more generally about the different forms 
of haya.

Trevor Peterson
CUA/Semitics