Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org>]

On 18/03/2007 16:55, Vadim Cherny wrote:
> ...
> Regarding wayiqtols, would you agree that no evidence contradicts
> understanding them as "and + future tense" with deictic center shifts?
>
>   
Well, on this hypothesis it is difficult to explain the WAYYIQTOLs at 
the beginning of the books WAYYIQRA' = Leviticus and WAYDABBER = 
Numbers, and several others if I remember correctly, including Jonah and 
Ruth which cannot plausibly be understood as continuations of other 
books. And then there certainly are cases where WAYYIQTOL is not 
strictly sequential. So I think you will find it hard to show that 
WAYYIQTOL is always relative future. A more plausible suggestion would 
be that the regular use of this form in narrative originated in cases 
where there was a clearly defined prior deictic centre, and use of the 
form was then generalised to include cases where the deictic centre has 
not been clearly set up. In other words, WAYYIQTOL might have started as 
a relative future tense, but later shifted to be a simple narrative 
tense in fact used at least primarily in the past.

But this does not explain apocopation, and I think I still prefer the 
alternative hypothesis that it is an originally completely distinct verb 
form.

--
Peter Kirk
E-mail:  peter AT qaya.org
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Website: http://www.qaya.org/