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  • From: furuli AT online.no
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Isaiah 53
  • Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 15:33:37 +0200

Dear Vadim,

I know that my suggestion is very unusual, in fact, it rejects a view that all scholars have accepted from the Karaite Ibn Nuh in the 11th century CE and up to the present, except less than twenty scholars, namely, that the WAYYIQTOL is different from YIQTOL. And further, if my conclusions are accepted, a few thousand verbs in modern Bible translations are in need of a re-translation. I do not think that I am more clever than others, but I have two advantages, 1) I have analyzed the whole corpus of classical Hebrew, and 2) I have based my study on the assumption that Hebrew has at least two conjugations, possibly four.

One's assumption is extremely important. If you start with the assumption that there *are* four conjugations, most likely you end with four conjugations as well - this is a fine example of circularity. In my view, so many fine scholars have been led astray because they have started with the assumption of four conjugations and because no systematic attempt has been made to distinguish between pragmatic and semantic factors.

An illuminating example of the last problem is that narrative contexts are used to find whether WAYYIQTOL represent past tense or the perfective aspect. But the worst place to look for this meaning (from the perspective of semantics versus pragmatics) is in narrative contexts. This is so, because any verb that is used to narrate consecutive, past events must per definition have past reference, and the events must be completed at speech time. Therefore, from a semantic point of view, we learn very little, if anything at all regarding the nature of WAYYIQTOLs in narrative contexts.

The first thing to do before an analysis of verbs starts, is to differentiate between diachronic and synchronic matters. I have used much time to study the diachronic evolution of Classical Hebrew. And interestingly, while we can detect Early Biblical Hebrew, Standard Biblical Hebrew, Late Biblical Hebrew, and Qumranic Hebrew with many differences in vocabulary and grammar, I have found no evidence that the semantic meaning of the Hebrew conjugations have changed from the first part of the Tanakh to the last part was written. To the contrary, there is much evidence that the meaning did not change.

I have further studied the Amarna letters, Ugaritic, Canaanite, and Akkadian grammar in order to see if there is evidence for a preterit antecedent to WAYYIQTOL in these languages. The answer is negative; the greatest weakness of the claims for the existence of such an antecedent, is the complete lack of distinction between past tense and past reference, i.e. between semantic and pragmatic factors. When we in the Mesha inscription find about thirty YIQTOLs with prefixed WAW with past reference (and one YIQTOL with past reference without prefixed WAW), this is taken as proof that WAYYIQTOL existed outside Israel. But as Muraoka once wisely wrote, how can we know that prefix forms with a prefixed WAW are what Hebrew grammars technically call *consecutive imperfect*? How can we know that the WAWs are not simple conjunctions? The conclusion that the Mesha inscription and in other documents are evidence for WAYYIQTOL is a glaring example of this lack of differentiation between semantics and pragmatics.

On the basis of a thorough study of the classical Hebrew corpus with the conclusion that the semantic meaning of verbs has not evolved inside the corpus, ( and contrary to the strange meaning of some that verbs have different semantic meaning in poetry and prose), all the verbs can be treated on an equal footing. The whole study will later be published, but allow me a few excerpts from my data base: 998 WAYYIQTOLs with non-past reference; 965 QATALs with future reference, 53 WEYIQTOLs with past reference, 2.505 QATALs and 1.804 YIQTOLs with present reference. 1.022 YIQTOLs with past reference. Most revealing is a comparison of the environments of the YIQTOLs and WAYYIQTOLs with past reference. It can be demonstrated that the reason why scores upon scores of the YIQTOLs with past reference lack a prefixed WAW, is that another word precedes the YIQTOL, thus preventing such a prefix. But often a WAW is prefixed to the preceding word (be it a negation, adverb or substantive), so if the word order was changed, the YIQTOL would naturally become a WAYYIQTOL.


Best regards

Rolf

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo



Dear Rolf,

You surely know that your suggestion is more than a bit unusual. Could you
support your argument statistically? It basically contradicts my
experience, and although I'm always prepared to change my views when facts
change, there has to be a good evidence.

Over a period of ten years I have analyzed all the more than 70.000
verbs of the Tanakh, the DSS and the inscriptions as to temporal
reference, modality and different discourse functions. My conclusion,
for which I present more than one thousand examples in my thesis, is
that Classical Hebrew has no tenses but two aspects (with very
different characteristics compared with their English counterparts).
The forms YIQTOL, WAYYIQTOL, and WEYIQTOL all represent the
imperfective aspect and QATAL and WEQATAL represent the perfective
aspect. The view of the "reversal of tense" by WE- WAY(Y) collides
head on with the data material.<


Best regards,

Vadim
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