Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Ken Penner" <pennerkm AT mcmaster.ca>]

 Hi Yitzhak,

In answer your original question,

> Or, if not that, a "concordance" of grammatical structures whereby one
> could look up how common is the use of waw to denote past tense verbs
> and how often it is used for future tense verbs.  This could give some
> hint as to how uncommon the above verb is in Kings as opposed to
> Esther.  Any help would be welcome :-)

My dissertation focusses on the verbs in Hebrew from a period immediately
after the biblical texts: Qumran Hebrew. The following data may help answer
your question by showing the trajectory of Late Biblical Hebrew (ignoring
possible archaizing tendencies of the Qumran authors).

Of the verbs I have examined so far, the relationship between Speech Time
and Event Time (i.e., Absolute Tense: Past) in the verbs for which the
context offers reasonable certainty is:

Conj.   Past    Present Future  Total
-yqtl   21      77      702     800
wyqtl   115     32      67      214
-qtl    333     50      56      439
wqtl    2       2       160     164
A. Part.        4       9       44      57
P. Part.        27      4       30      61
Total   522     293     1227    2042

As a percentage of each tense, that works out to:

Conj.   Past    Present Future  Total
-yqtl   4%      26%     57%     39%
wyqtl   22%     11%     5%      10%
-qtl    64%     17%     5%      21%
wqtl    0%      1%      13%     8%
A. Part.        1%      3%      4%      3%
P. Part.        5%      1%      2%      3%
Total   100%    100%    100%    100%

As a percentage of each form, that works out to:

Conj.   Past    Present Future  Total
-yqtl   3%      10%     88%     100%
wyqtl   54%     15%     31%     100%
-qtl    76%     11%     13%     100%
wqtl    1%      1%      98%     100%
A. Part.        7%      16%     77%     100%
P. Part.        44%     7%      49%     100%
Total   26%     14%     60%     100%

To interpret these tables, what you call "future verbs" with waw (i.e.,
wyqtl) refer to the past in 54% of cases and to the future in 31% of cases
in these Dead Sea scrolls. What you call "past verbs" with waw (i.e. wqtl)
refer to the past in 1% of cases, and to the future in 98% of cases.

Ken Penner, McMaster/DSS
Dead Sea Scrolls scholars' list owner,
http://mailman.McMaster.CA/mailman/listinfo/g-megillot