Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>]

On 19/09/2005 11:35, Vadim Cherny wrote:

> > > Present tense
> > > Genesis 32:32 "the children of Israel do not eat"
> > >      
>
> would not eat
> Grammatical future tense is used for repeated or continuous action.
>
>  
This is not future in English or Hebrew.

> > > Genesis 37:15 "What seekest thou?"
> > >      
>
> literary, What would you seek
> This seems to parallel Spanish probable present, "I would say, he is at home
> now"
>
>  
Not future, we seem to agree.

> ...
>
> > > Past tense
> > > Judges 11:40 "the daughters of Israel went from year to year"
> > >      
>
> Annually, the daughters of Israel would go
> past continuous
>
>  
So, your "future tense" is past continuous or habitual, in several 
examples (snipped).

> ...
>
> Nowm we may argue whether deictic shift is behind idiomatic usage of future
> tense for past continuous. It well might be: narrators transposed to the
> beginning of sequence, or even to its cause. ...
>  

Can you provide any evidence at all for such a deictic shift?

> ... The point, however, is that past continuous sense of "would do" does not
> impeach English tenses, and neither should similar use impeach Hebrew
> tenses.
>  

Well, if you point is that the English "would" form and the Hebrew 
YIQTOL can be used here, that is of course true. But because these verb 
forms are used regularly for past continuous and habitual events, 
neither of them is a future tense.

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/



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