Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Rolf Furuli" <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear David,

You have really been busy with writing this week-end. We both have plenty to
do, so I think it is time to end our discussion.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David Kummerow" <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>
To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Monday, November 28, 2005 4:19 AM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Hebrew grammar, (was Zech 6:8)


Hi Rolf,

Again see below.

[snip]

 In Phoenician texts the infinitive
> absolute is
> the narrative verb, but that does not make it perfective or preterit.

Do you have references to secondary literature here: I would really like
to look at this.

RF:
Look out for a coming Beiheft to "Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen
Gesellschaft" where you will find a 30-page article by me regarding Hebrew
verbs, including a new translation and discussion of the Phoenician Karatepe
inscriptions.

In forty lines of the Karatepe inscription we find 21 infinitive absolutes
used as narrative verbs, 16 of which have a prefixed WAW.

You find the text of the inscriptions in J. C.  L. Gibson (1982) "Textbook 
of
Syrian Semitic Inscriptions" vol 3.  You can find a discussion of the role
of infinitive absolute in M. G. A. Guzzo (1999) "Phönizisch-Punische
Grammatik 3. Auflage, Analecta Orientalia 55.  See also the dissertation of
Marcus, who disagree regarding the role of infinitive absolute: I. D. Marcus
(1970) "Aspects of the Ugaritic Verb in the Light of Comparative Semitic
Grammar.  You should also take a look at C. R. Krahmalkov (2001) "A
Phoenician-Punic Grammar". Krahmalkov presents the view that "Tense, Aspect,
and Mood in Phoenician are entirely a function of syntax, not morphology."

As you, I assume that a difference in morphology signals a difference in
meaning. But if the differences can be explained on the basis of phonology
and stress, the seemingly morphological differences are not real. In my
view, this is the case with WAYYIQTOL and WEYIQTOL, and therefore I see no
semantic difference.

I do not accept Galia´s view that each WAYYIQTOL has a new reference time.
Cook demonstrated that this is not true. I would argue that it is the WAW of
the WAYYIQTOL form and not the WAYYIQTOL  itself that causes the narrative
to move forward. In the Phoenician Karatepe inscriptions WAW does exactly
the same, and the verb used is an infinitive absolute. Nobody would say that
this infinitive absolute has some intrinsic completedness of an intrinsic
past tense. The infinitive absolute simply presents the verbal idea of the
root without making visible the beginning or end or anything else. I would 
argue
that in Hebrew the WAW  signals the events in consecution, and this WAW (as
WAY-) is prefixed to an imperfective verb.  Thus, WAYYIQTOL is imperfective!

In Akkadian the distinction between the short IPRUS and the longer IPARRAS
often is not easy to see. When my students do their home work, they look for
the lexical meaning of the words and for the syntax, but very often they
have not considered whether the verb is IPARRAS or IPRUS. They feel they do
not need that, because they can gather the temporal reference from the
context. If you give your Hebrew students a narrative text where you have
deleted prefixes and suffixes and only the verb roots occur, I am sure they
will be able to translate the text and find the correct time setting. We
simply do not need verb forms with a particular intrinsic meaning in
narrative texts, but any verb form can be used.

But why, then, are imperfective verbs in the thousands used in Hebrew
narratives contrary to what is normal in other languages?  I define (this is
a broad definition) the imperfective aspect as a close-up view of a small
part of an event with details visible. This means that when the imperfective
aspect is used there are three big options (and several smaller ones)
available regarding what is focussed upon:

1) The beginning and a small part of the action.
2) Progressive action after the beginning and before the end.
3) The end and  a resultant state.

In contrast with the perfective aspect, the imperfective one cannot make
visible both beginning and end. It is also worth noting that the
imperfective aspect is open-ended even when the end of the event is included
in its focus, because the end of the resultant state is not seen.

Curtius looked at Greek aspects through Slavic and German eyes, and the
great scholars of the 19th and 20th century looked at Hebrew verbs  through
German and English eyes. This of course can lead people astray. Modern
people are satisfied with hearing that a person did that, and did that, and
did that. I think the Hebrews of old in many contexts were much more
concerned with the details of the verbal action than we are, and therefore
they so often used the imperfective aspect (WAYYIQTOL)  in narrative texts.
By this they made visible ingressive, progressive and resultative actions.
Resultativity is very difficult to convey into English, but that is not the
case with ingressiveness and progression.  Translators should therefore to a
much greter degree translate narrative verbs as "she started to...; she
proceeded to...; she continued to...; she was...", and even in some cases
"she tried to...; she attempted to..."

[snip]


>  > I respect your disagreement with me.  In this case I endorse the
> Words of
>  > Waltke/O´Connor p. 460 "How can forms, each of which "represent" all
> three
>  > English major tenses have a primarily temporal value?"
>  >
>  >
>
> Yes, but the same question can be levelled at the aspectual view: how
> can forms that have a primarily temporal value represent both aspects?
>
> RF:
> As Dahl knows, Modern Burmese does not have grammaticalized tenses, but
> those speaking it
> are just as much concerned with past, present, and future time as we are.
> Therefore, they have ways to express this by other means than by the use
> of
> tenses. I would argue that the same is true in classical Hebrew, and
> Hebrew
> aspects together with the other parts of the clauses are excellent tools
> to
> express time.

You didn't actually answer my question: again, how can forms that have a
primarily temporal value represent both aspects?

RF:
I am sorry that I did not answer your question adequately. But I think that
my words above regarding the imperfective aspect used in narratives will do
the job. I do not agree that verb forms primarily have temporal value.



> DK:
> Your answer is to modify the definition of aspect (and also to equate
> wayyiqtol with (we)yiqtol and all the other necessary things (eg the
> hypthesis regarding way-) in order to acheive this). The reason in my
> view is that the prototypical tense and aspectual values of a particular
> verb can be neutralised in certain constructions or is constructionally
> dependent (I can provide a bit of evidence when I find a bit more time
> if you like).
>
> RF:
> I welcome evidence in order to understand what you mean by
> "neutralization".
> For example, in hypothetical conditional clauses in English verbs can be
> used differently from their use in main clauses, but I would not say that
> the tense is neutralized. The verb forms "went" and "came" are preterits
> in
> any clause.

OK. I'm having to rush here as I have other things to do than write emails!

1. Evidence for past-perfective qatal comes from its use in
non-paratactic constructions where its default use is anterior (cf
Zevit's monograph). Gnomic statements, prophetic perfect, and
performatives can all be viewed in a past-perfective view (cf Rogland).
Assuming, then, default past-perfective semantics for qatal,
neutralisation can occur:

a) past imperfective qatal in constructions or contexts requiring a past
tense (eg Gen 38:9; Num 11:8; 21:9; Jud 2:18; 6:3; 2 Kgs 18:4).

b) qatal in balanced clauses (again, see the Cristofaro reference from
my previous email on this phenomenon). For example weqatal following an
interrogative involving yiqtol in an interrogative sentence (eg Exod
2:7; 1 Sam 23:2). The past tense meaning of qatal has been neutralised
in the paratactic construction as the two clauses have been integrated
into a single construction: the tense of qatal has thus been neutralised
by the construction as a whole, ie by the preceeding interrogative and
non-past verb form which has scope over the entire construction. This
is, mutatis mutandis, the same with weqatal following volitives (cf
Dallaire; Diehl).

c) qatal in future clauses (eg Ruth 2:21). Either the past tense is
neutralised or the verb functions as a relative past (ie anterior).

2. past perfective wayyiqtol can have perfective aspect neutralised if
the context requires (this is rare, at least in our texts) (eg Num
10:35; 1 Sam 1).

3. future-imperfective yiqtol can also be neutralised:

a) imperfective aspect can be neutralised in future perfective
predications (eg Gen 18:11).

b) past tense can be neutralised for the preference of the expression of
imperfective aspect (eg Gen 2:10; 29:2).

The multifunctionality apparent in the verbal system is due to the
limited forms. But more forms are not necessary in Hebrew in order to
achieve sucessful communication as the tense or aspect of the forms can
be neutralised for the expression of the desired remaining
non-neutralised value. In this way, qatal is a past-perfective verbal
form and yiqtol is a (present-)future-imperfective etc.

RF:
I explain this "neutralization" differently, since there is no tense or
temporal reference to neutralize. First one detail. The term "prophetic
perfect" is used in most modern grammars, and it is parroted by students,
Yet, it has absolutely no basis in reality, but the term was constructed ad
hoc, in order to save the view that QATAL only portrayed completed actions. 
In order to demonstrate the existence of "prophetic perfect" one has to show 
that there is a difference in meaning between QATALs and YIQTOLs and other 
verbs used with future reference. Nobody has tried that, and there is no 
such difference.

I use one chapter in my dissertation to show that hundreds of YIQTOLs,
WAYYIQTOLs, QATALs,  WEQATALs, participles, and infinitives are used in the
Tanakh with the same meaning (the description of the static borders of
Israel in Joshua 15-19; the 470 doublets, especially Psalm 18-2 Samuel 22;
the excellent wife in Prov 31:10-31 etc.). In other cases particular verb
forms are needed.  Why this situation of seemingly linguistic anarchy on on
hand and precision on the other?  My answer is that there are different
requirements for precision and linguisitc convention.

The difference between phonemic and phonetic transcription can illustrate
the first point. Because a language can have different allophones of one
phoneme, several phonetic transcriptions can be subsumed under one phonemic
transcription.  Depending on the requirement of precision, whether we want
to focus on the differences of sound or the differences of meaning, we
choose a phonetic of phonemic transcription.

We can apply this to Psalm 2:1,2. Here we find two QATALs and two YIQTOLs
(including one clause-initial YIQTOL indictive). The QATALs and YIQTOLs have
different semantic meanings, but in this text the requirement of precision
is low and this difference simply is not made visible.



[snip]


> RF:
> While the very general distinction complete(d)/incomplete often is usedin
> connection with aspect, there is very much confusion as to what aspect
> actually is. L. J. Brinton (1988) "The Development of English Aspectual
> Systems Aspectualizers and Post-verbal Particles" p. 5 lists seven
> different
> kinds of aspects under the heading "Confusion of sspect terminology". Then
> he lists twenty-five different terms that have been conected with these
> aspects.
>
> Dahl has lectured in Oslo, and I have discussed aspect with him. That he
> asked linguists in different languages how particular concepts he
> associated
> with aspect worked in their languages does not prove that aspect is the
> same
> in all aspectual languages. The concepts "reference time" and "event time"
> that I use represent the "deep structures" of aspect, to borrow a term
> from
> Chomsky. These parameters can be used to analyze the imperfective and
> perfective aspects in any aspectual language. So I think that "aspect" is
> the right term to describe finite verbs in classical Hebrew.

The fact remains, despite your attempt to muddy the notion of "aspect"
with a dated reference, that other languages have been sucessfully
analysed without a redefinition, while your analysis of Hebrew requires
one.


Hoping the above might help you to position my position.

RF:
Thank you for your detailed exposition of your position.

Sincerely,
David Kummerow.


Best regards,

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo