Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

Peter:

First, you have experienced the understanding of foreign 
language lexemes that it is not uncommon for words in 
another language to fall between English terms, sometimes 
sounding more like one term in English, sometimes more like 
another. So while translations of the term may be diverse 
in English, within the language itself the meaning is 
consistant and usually rather compact.

One such lexeme is the WAW prefix. I understand it as 
signifying a continuation of that which goes on before 
(though in cases such as Jonah 1:1 what was it that went 
on before?). Usually it can be translated as "and". But 
sometimes that "and" is rather strong, where the following 
is the consequence of what precedes it and the English word 
"that" makes a better translation, as in Isaiah 53:2. I 
have noticed other verses in my readings where the WAW has 
that stronger meaning, but I don't remember their addresses 
off the top of my head. (An example in English, "He so 
hurried that he ran..." would have a WAW in Hebrew for the 
"that".) By allowing for the "stronger" use of WAW in 
Leviticus 20:17 preceding the NKRTW a reading of the verse 
will not force us into a unique meaning for XSD rather the 
XSD HW) WNKRTW L(YNY BNY (MM is the complete phrase.

XSD is another lexeme in Hebrew with no equivelant in 
English. And just as I told Harold Holmyard concerning 
X+)T having a broader "secular" meaning than its most 
common theological application, so we should not leave 
out the possibility that XSD also has a broader "secular" 
meaning than found in its theological uses. And in its 
"secular" uses could have somewhat a negative flavor 
while still preserving its basic meaning of "undeserved 
good favor".

As for lexemes having diverse meanings, while I don't rule 
that out, after studying a few foreign languages I have 
found that lexemes having diverse meanings are quite rare. 
That is not the same as recognizing that a lexeme may have 
such a broad meaning that it can be translated by several 
lexemes in another language, nor is it a claim that all 
lexemes have narrowly defined boundaries in meaning, 
rather a recognition that it is rare for a lexeme to have 
both one meaning and its near opposite, or even a 
completely unrelated one. Biblical Hebrew is no exception. 
(This is one area where I, as a lexicographer, disagree 
with Reinier de Blois and his lexicon according to 
semantic domains.)

Karl W. Randolph.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Kirk" <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
> 
> On 23/08/2005 01:45, Karl Randolph wrote:
> 
> > ...
> >
> >> Well, the first clause in this verse starts at the beginning and 
> >> continues until XESED HU', with 'ASHER introducing a clause 
> >> subordinate to this one. The sentence structure in fact seems to 
> >> state that it is the man who is XESED, but it could be 
> >> interpreted that the whole situation is so descibed. But I don't 
> >> see that the meaning could a description of what follows, which 
> >> is separated off by the VAV conjunction attached to a QATAL verb 
> >> (i.e. WEQATAL) which always indicates a new clause.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> > Looking at the verse, the )$R precedes the XSD HW) so that the 
> > latter is either part of the subordinate clause, or the 
> > introduction to the following clause. ...
> >
> 
> Not at all. )$R introduces a subordinate clause which is very often 
> embedded within the main clause. And that seems to be what is 
> happening here (Lev 20:17), at the formal syntactical level, 
> literally "A man {who takes his sister, daughter of his father or 
> daughter of his mother and sees her nakedness and she sees his 
> nakedness} he/it is XESED." {...} indicates the embedded clause. 
> Formally HU' is a resumptive pronoun referring back to the man.
> 
> > ... I read it as the latter.
> >
> > Secondly, does the WAW prefix on a verb always indicate a new clause, ...
> >
> 
> This is my understanding.
> 
> > ... or only when affixed on a Qatal? I read the WAW to have the 
> > same force as on the final verb in Isaiah 53:2. ...
> >
> 
> I would read this as a separate clause "(he had) no appearance ... 
> we desired him". The semantic link between these clauses is a 
> difficult question.
> 
> >
> > ... On a related issue, when I see applications of a noun that is 
> > used well over 100 times in Tanakh, all of them having one 
> > meaning and only once apparently having a different and opposite 
> > meaning, I then question why? Is this a special figure of speach? 
> > Did I misunderstand the text? Is there possible copyest error? Is 
> > this a loan word from another language that just happened to have 
> > the same form as a previous lexeme in the language (though in 
> > this case, with Torah being the earliest section of Tanakh, it is 
> > very unlikely)? Are we looking at an unusual though acceptable 
> > grammatical construct? Is this slang? In short, a one time 
> > opposite use raises many red flags.
> >
> >
> 
> I agree with you, Karl. I am not like Harold, relying on 
> authorities. But I have looked at the context of these three uses 
> of XSD, and I cannot see a way in which they are not a very 
> different sense of the word than the typical one - which is itself 
> rather diverse. But one thing I understand but you don't seem to, 
> is that in Hebrew like every other language many words have very 
> diverse meanings, and it is dangerous to assume otherwise.
> 
> -- Peter Kirk
> peter AT qaya.org (personal)
> peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
> http://www.qaya.org/

-- 
___________________________________________________________
Sign-up for Ads Free at Mail.com
http://promo.mail.com/adsfreejump.htm