Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Vadim Cherny" <VadimCherny AT mail.ru>]

> Vadim claimed that Piel is merely an intensive Qal. I’ve heard that claim
before from others.

I would say, "originally and remotely" related to intensity. Morphological
argument, catav - c'tEv - cittev, is the strongest testimony to intensity.
piel is paal pronounced forcefully.
Many verbs exist only in paal or only in piel. This depends on the root
meaning. Recall the same thing with verbs and adjectives: many roots have
either only verbs, or only an adjective.

Whether piel is intensive or causative, or whatever, is really subjective.
We have very different notions of many actions (verbs) than the ancients.
Recall that modern languages often use other prepositions with verbs than
Hebrew does. What is certain, is that piel was for whatever reason
pronounced more intensely than paal. But I thinkm subjectively, that
intensity might be envisaged in semantics of most piel verbs.

Vadim Cherny