Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Trevor Peterson" <06peterson AT cua.edu>]

Clay wrote:

> A "poststructuralist" might be temped to ask what difference 
> it makes how a word was derived in the past?
> 
In one sense none. But if we want to try to make sense out of how the
root and stem system in Hebrew works, we need to take this sort of thing
into account. (Why would we want to bother with the whole business?
Well, that's a little more difficult to answer. It can be of some help
when we encounter a poorly attested word. We try to rely on usage
wherever possible, but if you have only one instance of a word, that
doesn't do too much good. Looking at its relationship to other words can
help provide some reasonable guesses.)

Trevor Peterson
CUA/Semitics