Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Herman Meester" <crazymulgogi AT gmail.com>]

I know Rolf Furuli's point of view regarding this issue, but the idea
that there was, originally, no difference between wayyiqtol and
weyiqtol is (I know I run the risk of enticing some members, incl.
myself, to a long and heavy thread again ;) improbable if not
impossible.
Masora means tradition, not invention.  The lengthened prefix
consonant is real. It must have been there for ages prior to the
masoretes. Any invention of this kind would have lead to discussions,
none of which we find traces of in Jewish literature.

Biblical poetry, which is what Rolf bases his thesis on, cannot be
used to discuss this problem because in poetry, tenses, or verb
aspect, or whatever, is blurred on purpose by the poet in order to
give poetry its own syntax. This is a feature of all oral poetry in
semi-sedentary or fully sedentary people's dialect continuums (i.e.
areas where every ten miles there is some kind of language change, so
that people can effortlessly understand other people that live ten
miles off, but have trouble understanding people twenty miles off, and
have no idea what people say thirty miles off), where travelling poets
had to make themselves understood over rather large areas. Resulting
in an artificial, non-"domestic" language with a unique and flexible
syntax. Instances of this have been described for real (i.e.
contemporarily) in several parts of the world, a.o. in Morocco. Cf.
the medieval "troubadour" in the part of Europe where Romanic
languages are spoken; they crossed linguistic borders without
bothering.

In other words, syntax of biblical poetry and syntax of biblical prose
each deserve their own description.

regards,
Herman


2006/3/14, Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>:
> On 3/14/06, Rolf Furuli wrote:
> > Dear Yitzhak,
> >
> > In the text of the Hexapla that is known to us we find at least 10
> > WAYYIQTOLs and 8 WEYIQTOLs.  They all have the prefix OU- where
> > the Masoretes have WE- and WA-. Would Yuditsky and yourself argue
> > that the OU-prefix represents the same original vowel, that is, there were
> > no difference between WAYYIQTOL and WEYIQTOL in Origen's Vorlage?
> > Or could the OU- represent two different original vowels? And in that
> > case, which vowels?
>
> Dear Rolf,
>
> I have no idea what Yuditsky argues yet beyond the quotes in the blog.  I
> thought those two references were interesting to point out to the list.  The
> Karaite Arabic reference I looked up, but only a quick look through.
> I intend to look both up as time allows.
>
> Yitzhak Sapir
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