Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

> > Similarly, weqatal is often employed superficially as future reference.
But
> > that occurs predominantly in prophetic visions. Prophets relate the
visions
> > which had already occurred to them, which they had fully seen. The
action
> > is, indeed, past to them - and they employ the past tense, wecatav means
> > "and he wrote." The event is still in the future for listeners, but
past,
> > occurred for the prophet.
> >
> >
> I understand what you are saying for WAYYIQTOL and I see some sense in
> it, i.e. if the deictic centre is fixed at the first event in a chain of
> consecutive events, the events after the first are relative future. But
> this doesn't work with WEQATAL in passages like Exodus 25-30, compare
> with Exodus 36-39, where WEQATAL also gives a chain of events which are
> future relative to the first event in the chain - which is given with
> jussive YIQTOL.
> Peter Kirk

I agree that weqatals in Ex25 don't fit straightforwardly into the deictic
center shift hypothesis.
One possibility, admittedly remote, is that Ex25 employs weqatals in deictic
center shift, reminiscent of "make sure you have DONE it". Past tense is
employed to underscore that the action is assured, considered as done.

Another possibility, more plausible, requires us to consider other uses of
waw. In hofal (hufal) and paol (paul) stems, waw reverses the verbs into
passive mode. Waw is also used as conjunction "but" which reverses the
meaning of preceding clause.
Waw could also be used as reversing device in weqatal. Waw reverses past
into the future tense. There is some confusion, as waw sometimes used as
reversing prefix (weqatal) and in other cases as conjunction "and"
(prophetic visions).

Regarding wayiqtols, would you agree that no evidence contradicts
understanding them as "and + future tense" with deictic center shifts?

Vadim Cherny