Biblical Hebrew Forum

[David Kummerow <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>]

Hi Karl,

Comments below:

> Dear David:
>
> This is not an attempt to defend Rolf and his dissertation, as I don't
> have access to it (nor to most books cited in these discussions), but
> I question some of your questions.
>
> First a general statement: dissertations and the research that leads
> to them are sometimes very narrow and restricted in their goal such
> that what applies to that narrow niche, does not work outside that
> niche. So when you question Rolf concerning aspects of the language
> outside of his niche, 1) he may not have researched them, so he cannot
> really answer you and 2) your questions may not apply to what he wrote
> about, or at least he thinks they don't. But like you, I question
> whether Rolf's use of Popperian logic is proper for linguistics.

The areas I have questioned him on are generally well known, eg 
paragogic nun with long prefix verb, third-person pronouns with nun used 
with long prefix verb, etc. This all appears in print and directly 
relates to Rolf's work, but, like I have said, is not discussed by him 
and the references, in the main, are missing from his bibliography. He 
does discuss other issues of morphology, though.


> You have repeatedly mentioned the use of "yesterday", yet when I
> looked at its uses in Tanakh, I found only 8 uses: of the three times
> as an adverb, once was with a yiqtol, the other two times with a qatal
> (hardly evidence for your position); the other five times modified
> with a prefix and used adjectively. Similarly, if Rolf is correct that
> the weqatal is a form of the qatal that does not change its function,
> and that the waw-flipper (or whatever the latest term for that is) is
> not operative, then "tomorrow" is used some times with a qatal.

Again, the issue is raised in the literature and potentially impacts 
Rolf's work is why I raised it (eg in Buth's grammar). We've been over 
this, so I won't reiterate (see my previous post to you), but to add 
that I actually agree with Rolf on qatal being the same verb as weqatal. 
weqatal is used  differently, though, mainly as a cosubordinate verb, 
sometimes in hypothetical/conditional constructions, and purpose/result 
constructions, so this does not negate the fact that as qatal it is not 
used.

An interesting question to ponder is: if an ancient Israelite were to 
utter the following to another, how would they be construed:

פָּקַדְנוּ אוֹתוֹ

נִפְקֹד אוֹתוֹ

אֲנִי פֹּקֵד אוֹתוֹ

> On 3/22/07, David Kummerow <farmerjoeblo at hotmail.com> wrote:
> ....
>  >
>  > Note that grammaticalisation can also EXTEND meaning. There's plenty of
>  > stuff on this in the linguistic literature. Regarding BH verbs, this is
>  > likely to have occurred with, say, the hithpael. The range of meanings
>  > is neatly described by Anstey 2005: 74-76, ie reflexive, grooming/body
>  > motion, naturally reciprocal, anticausative, and generic passive. It
>  > likely that meaning has been extended over time towards the passive, but
>  > it has not lost its reflexive function. Some, eg W-O, claim that it
>  > expresses even the passive and not just generic/gnomic passive. But do
>  > you see the problem if I were to follow your method? What is the
>  > uncancellable semantics denoted by the hithpael binyan? The more we move
>  > to "passive" the less "reflexive" the semantic, but the more "passive"
>  > the semantics, the less "reflexive". However, similarity exists between
>  > anticausative and generic passive and similarly reflexive and body
>  > motion and reciprocal. But if I were to strictly follow your approach
>  > you have applied to the verbal system, I am indeed very hard pressed to
>  > find a common denominator between all of these "functions"....
>  >
>  > ...
>  > Regards,
>  > David Kummerow.
>
> In this case, how many of these functions are the result of
> lexicographic methodology, and how much the result of different
> functions? Can you cite examples of each of all of these claimed uses?
> Sorry, I don't mean to put you on the hot grill, but I haven't seen
> all those functions in the hitpael. All I have seen is the reflexive
> usage, though my understanding of reflexive may be broader than your's
> or the authors' above.

Examples are from Anstey's article and dissertation:

Reflexive: Gen 24:64 "and she covered herself".
Body motion: Gen 24:40 "and he walked about".
Naturally reciprocal: Gen 42:1 "you look at each other".
Anticausative: Isa 29:14 "[insight] will vanish".
Generic passive: Prov 20:11 "a child is recognised [by his deeds]".

Waltke and O'Connor argue even for passive, see pp. 424ff.

French "se" covers the same range of functions as BH Hithpael. Russian 
"-sja" misses reflexive but adds passive. Each of these similarly 
presents problems for Rolf's methodology.

> In the past I have mentioned that I use a different lexicographic
> methodology than did Gesenius, BDB, or even list member Reinier de
> Blois, who emphasize the form of a word's use within semantic domains,
> which I have called sloppy lexicography (shame on me, that epithet is
> not really accurate nor fair), whereas I look for the action denoted.
> So when looking at a verb, I make note of whether it is a simple
> action (qal), passive (niphal), stative active or passive (piel and
> pual), causative active or passive (hiphil and hophal) and reflexive
> (hitpael), and look for a definition that fits the use. Whereas
> traditional dictionaries based on form can sometimes have different
> definitions depending on the binyan used, I see one action used in
> these different ways.
>
> As a result of my methodology, I have not seen the different functions
> of the hitpael that you mention above. That's why I ask for further
> clarification. (Will this be a new thread?)
>
> I have to admit at this point that my choice of looking at the action
> as primary instead of the form is a direct result of my ideology.
>
> Getting back to your questioning of Rolf, how many of your questions
> have responses that have differing answers from several sources, not
> just grammaticalization? And depending on responses from other
> sources, may or may not apply to Rolf's theories? But I wonder if Rolf
> is carrying the "uncancellable" too far in linguistics? Especially for
> an ancient language like Biblical Hebrew, which had sometimes creative
> spellings and inconsistent sentence word orders, and what other
> flexible elements?

Regarding the questions, everybody is unanimous these days that 
paragogic nun is only attached to the long prefix verb and ditto for the 
third-person pronouns augmented with nun. I think the same could be said 
about the status of the other features diagnostic of the short prefix 
verb vis-a-vis the long prefix verb.


> Yours, Karl W. Randolph.

Regards,
David Kummerow.