Biblical Hebrew Forum

[MarianneLuban AT aol.com]

In a message dated 10/6/2004 11:18:25 AM Pacific Daylight Time, 
dwashbur AT nyx.net writes:


> I agree with you that "and he said" etc. is a separate clause, not part of 
> the 
> direct speech being cited.  But the two examples Harold gave don't fall 
> into 
> 
> this category; in both instances, they are the second word in a standard 
> verbless clause.  Thus Gen 3:10 reads KY (YRM )NKY "because I am/was naked" 
> and Gen 4:9 reads H$MR )XY )NKI "am I my brother's keeper?"
> 
> Having said that, it could be that there are different "rules" for the 
> pronoun 
> depending on whether it's in a verbless clause such as these, or in a 
> clause 
> 
> with an explicit verbal element as in Judg 6:8.

Well--I am mistaken.  After a search through some texts here, I have found 
examples where "ink" is not the first thing in the clause, although it 
usually 
seems to be.  I had completely forgotten that there were times when an 
individual had to say something about himself (or herself) in a way that 
indicated 
denial.  Or ask a question.  Also, there are those terms like "Indeed", which 
people used to emphasize what they were trying to convey.  Here is an 
instance of 
making a statement by way of a question:

is bn inwk tAik  mwT

"Behold, not am I your mother?

This is in Neo-Egyptian, also called Late Egyptian, as distinguished from 
Middle Egyptian, the "holy language".  The "is" is translated in this 
instance as 
"behold" and sometimes it is given as "lo" or "indeed".  Seems to be a kind 
of all-purpose term of emphasis--and there are others.  The "bn" is the 
negative and "tAik" is "your".  In Middle Egyptian this would be expressed by 
a 
suffix ending like "mwt=k".  But Neo-Egyptian, for some reason, started a 
different 
writing syntax, using pronouns in the order that we do in English.  Whereas 
in Middle Egyptian (used until Greek and Roman times for official and 
religious 
texts only after about 1330 BCE) there had been no article "the" at all--this 
appeared, varying as to the noun in gender or plurality of same.  Later, 
there came "and", which had never been seen previously, either.  

Marianne Luban