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  • From: Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] The mystery of vav-consequtive
  • Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2005 08:13:11 +0200

Dear Ken,

I agree with you regarding Sperber's conclusions, and I mention this in my dissertation as well. The primary advantage of Sperber's grammar for the student of Hebrew verbs, is that the author presents so much data from the Hebrew Bible that contradicts the standard thinking. The second advantage is that he draws conclusions that contradict the established tradition. We should not study the sources in order to find conclusions that we can adopt. But we should study the data material and test the conclusions.

I agree with you that Cook and Smith are worth reading. Nontheless, Cook does not disinguish between past reference/past tense and future reference/future tense, something which in my view is a flaw and which can question his conclusions. Smith's conclusions are based on the presupposition that imperfect consecutive do exist and that prefix-forms+waw in the cognate languages can be interpreted as "converted" imperfects rather than as imperfects with the conjunction waw prefixed. This is of course questionable, and therefore his conclusions regarding the existence of particular examples are less than certain.

Another important source is L. McFall: "The Enigma of the Hebrew Verbal System" (1982). Sheffield:The Almond Press. The author outlines the different views regarding consecutive imperfect from the Masortes and up to 1954. All the different data he presents show the shaky foundation of the waw consecutive hypothesis.


Best regards

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo

Ken Penner wrote:

Rolf wrote:


In addition to Cook and Smith, who give much insight into the issue, I recommend A. Sperber: "A Historical Grammar of Biblical Hebrew". 1966: E. J. Brill. Reading Sperber will help against circularity and traditional thinking.


You seriously recommend Sperber's work? Certainly it is an example of
non-traditional thinking! Granted, I use it for the primary data collected
there, but not for his conclusions regarding the historical development of
Hebrew, especially its tenses. He certainly would not have agreed with your
aspect-based system, would he? IIRC, he saw two distinct dialects each with
one "tense", and when the literary output of these two dialects merged (in
the Biblical literature), it appeared that there were two "tenses." I think
we've come a long way since he formulated these ideas.

Ken Penner
McMaster/Hebrew









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