Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Joe Sprinkle <jsprinkle AT crossroadscollege.edu>]

>I don't know that this is a very good example of what you're trying to
> show. If the C of RWM is viewed as "cause to be high," the sense of
> "raise" fits quite well.

What I say is really part of a hypothesis that seeks to distinguish between 
Piel and Hiphil meanings of stative verbs.  What does the Hiphil do that is 
different when a stative verb has both Piel and Hiphil forms.  The lexicons 
often give the two identical glosses to such forms, though it seems to me 
probable that there is some nuance of difference.

Piel is not "intensive" for stative verbs, and not really "intensive" for 
actives ones.  Rather for active verbs Piel tends to multiply the action 
("kill" becomes "slaughter, kill a lot" [not kill intensively, but kill 
repeatedly].  But for stative verbs Piel produces the state of the stative 
verb. Thus RWM in Piel means "make something high" (emphasizing end result) 
whereas (with slightly different nuance) the Hiphil means "to raise 
something" (emphasizing process).

This works reasonably well, though not perfectly.  I illustrate with a few 
examples.

GDL "to be great" becomes "make great" (including making a child 
great/grown up by raising him) in Piel that emphasizes result, but 
"enlarge" (a process) in Hiphil.

RAXAB "be wide" does not occur in Piel in Biblical (or Mishnaic) Hebrew, 
but means "to widen, extend" in the Hiphil which emphasizes process.

ZQN "to be old" is not used in Biblical Hebrew in the Piel, but the Hiphil 
means "to grow older" (Job 14:8) (HALOT) which emphasizes process.

On the other hand, XaYaH "to be alive" means first of all in Piel "make 
something live" (the dead in Hos 6:2) but then secondarily "preserve 
alive." For this verb the Hiphil appears to have the same meaning "keep 
alive." Here my hypothesis seems to break down for the hiphil since it is 
result not process that seems in mind.

Yet the hypothesis seems to work often enough that I keep it as a working 
hypothesis.

The hypothesis then is that whereas Piel produces the state of the stative 
verb, the Hiphil/Aphel increases the state of the stative verb, and is 
therefore typically has a bit more emphasis on the dynamic aspect of the 
process.  Of course, once one increases the height of something, it is 
likely to have become high. Thus the meanings can easily overlap.

The example in Syriac is unusual.  If memory serves me well, I believe 
Syriac is the only Semitic language that has a causative of the copulative 
verb, though I am subject to correction on that.  If that is factually 
correct, it is the exception that proves the rule. Nonetheless, its 
existence in Syriac is compatible with my hypothesis.  According to R. 
Payne Smith's Syriac dictionary, the meaning for Syriac of the Aphel of HW' 
is "give existence, create" and is used in the expression "O Divine power 
who hast given existence to all things."  My hypothesis suggested a meaning 
of "increase existence for X," could be paraphrased "produces [emphaizing 
process] existence" and hence "create" [with an undertone of process of 
creation].  Since Hebrew had a perfectly good word for this meaning (BARA') 
there was little motive to use the Hiphil form of the verb, though of 
course it could have done so.

Trever, your point about medial W versus initial W is well taken.  However, 
I can only say that somewhere in Proto-NW Semitic medial W changed to Y or 
visa versa, for otherwise you would not have HAYAH "to be" in Hebrew and 
HAWAH "to be" in Aramaic.  That such a change regularly occurred for 
initial proto-Semitic W is well known in which the direction of change was 
from W to Y.  By analogy it is plausible that it occurred in Hebrew HAYAH 
as well with Aramaic preserving the earlier form with medial W that later 
became Y in Hebrew of the Bible.  Does not the change from Y to W seem less 
likely given the trend in initial W?

As for the vowels, it is true that HAYAH as vocalized by the Masorets does 
not use the A vowel for imperfect preformatives Y, T and N for the Qal 
imperfect despite the guttural H first consonant.  I am not sure that the 
biblical writers as opposed to the Masorets didn't use the A vowels. You 
can't tell in an unvocalized text.  In any case, even the Masorets do use A 
vowels for preformatives of some First He forms such as the Qal imperfect 
of HALAM in Psalm 74:6 and Qal imperfect forms of HAPAK.  The form of 
Yahweh is personal names seem to confirm an A vowel under the initial 
yod.  If Yahweh is a verb (I cannot prove it is, but if it is), I can 
explain the A vowel as influenced by the first guttural as was in the case 
of these verbs.  I would then posit that Hebrew by the time the Masorets 
vocalized the text ceased to use the A vowel for preformatives of HYH, but 
that archaic (perhaps pre-Biblical) Hebrew was using the A vowel 
preformative when it created the form YAHWEH off of the verb HWH.

I only claim a plausible case for this view, not an airtight one.

Joe

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