Biblical Hebrew Forum

["wattswestmaas" <wattswestmaas AT eircom.net>]

Dear Vadim,

You say some very helpful things but this one comment defies explanation,
My Two children aged 6 and 8 could not speak a word of English 11 months
ago.  THey went straight into an Irish school and after just 4 months were
speaking intelligible English and after 6 months they matched every other 8
year old child's english.  Are there any adults capable of such enormous
feats?

It took me a massive 4 years to speak  Dutch on a level equal to native
speakers AND I HAD TO LEARN GRAMMATICAL RULES AND LEARN HOW TO THINK IN
THEIR GRAMMATICAL WAY.

Hence I appreciate the importance of my own question.

Respectfully yours

Chris.



Chris,

You're talking of the people who wouldn't even understand a notion of
perfect tense. Those were very simple folks. Don't ascribe to them a love to
modern grammar.


Sincerely,

Vadim Cherny

>
> Everything that you all have said has clarified a few things and I
> appreciate the ways in which you have explained things.
>
> One last thing;  given that the imperfect can be so easily used to express
> an action that WILL take place at an unknown point in time in the future,
> why use the Perfect to do the same job?  --  I dare to take an
> UNproffessional leap here and offer a thought??  --  Could the idea behind
> the imperfect be that:  This FUTURE event has a beginning but no known
end,
> whereas the perfect expresses an event to take place in the future that
has
> BOTH a beginning AND a KNOWN end.
>
> Since I have not had  the years behind me to acquaint myself with all the
> facts I am sure that I am incorrect, however I needed to suggest this.
>
> Thanks Chris.
>
>
>
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