Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>]

Joseph,

What is referred to as the Hebrew "definite article" HA- is in my  
opinion but a contracted and appended form of the personal pronouns  
HI, HU, HEM, HEN, as half heartedly conceded even ("almost has the  
force of" on page 404) by GKC. It is used for anything revealed (or  
assumed) as existing, and which can, therefore, be unambiguously  
referred to as 'he, she' or 'it' by both speaker and listener. The  
third person personal pronouns are by themselves combinations: HI = H- 
I and HU = H-U consisting of the existence marker H and the original  
personal pronouns I and U. Standing alone they are made to  
differentiate gender: HI for female, and HU for male, but are  
otherwise left gender indifferent in attached or inserted form. The  
closest HA- gets to HI is in its HE form (now almost totally  
discarded in spoken Hebrew) as in HE-XALUC, 'the insurgent'. This  
existence marker H appears as the stronger X or K in ANOKI, ANAXNU  
and the genitive attachments -AK, -AKAH, -AKEM, AKEN, all related to  
XAI, 'alive', AX, 'brother', )OAX 'bird', and HAYA or HAVA, 'was'.
One may think of definiteness as being achieved by an imaginary tag,  
caption or plaque bearing the name of the indicated object and  
attached to it or to its pointed out image. Obviously unique objects,  
carry such caption by default as HA-AREC, 'the earth', HA-$EME$, 'the  
sun', HA-YARDEN, 'the Jordan river', HA-MELEK, 'the king' (as long as  
he reigns. Think about a picture of the current president being  
captioned HA-NASI) =  HI NASI) = HU NASI), "the president").
 It is used also in the participle form for the actor, as in HA-MAL) 
AK HA-GO)EL )OTYI, 'the angel who redeems me', of Genesis 48:16. The  
nature of this HA- becomes obvious by reading it primevally as HI MAL) 
AK HI GO)EL )OTYI, or equivalently, HU MAL)AK HU GO)EL )OTYI.
Otherwise it is )EXAD or )AXAT, 'one', as in VA-YHI )I$ )EXAD of 1  
Samuel 1:1.
Every person who has performed a noticeable act may be singled out by  
HA-, such as HA-MELIC, 'the interpreter' of Genesis 42:23, ( as  
though a picture is added to the text bearing the caption "HA- 
MELIC"), HA-NA(AR, 'the servant', of Genesis 18:7, HA-PALIT, 'the  
remnant', of Genesis 14:13, and HA-MAGID, 'the informer' of 2 Samuel  
15:13.
HA- is not used in a construct link form, for instance, YO(EC DAVID,  
'David's confidant'. Country names are left indefinite either because  
they are short for a linked form such as  ISRAEL for EREC ISRAEL, or  
because they can not be pictured.
Curiously enough the English say 'he went to school', but 'he went to  
the store'.
Hebrew often omits the indefinite article even in reference to one  
item. Both English 'he ate an apple' and 'he ate meat' is  
equivalently HU )AKAL TAPUAX and HU )AKAL BASAR.
Reference to a generic object is without HA-. A text book picture of,  
say, a donkey would carry the bare caption XAMOR. But reference to  
any specific object, even a hypothetical one, is with a HA- as in  
MIYAD HA-)ARI UMIYAD HA-DOV, 'out of the paw of the lion, and out of  
the paw of the bear' of 1 Samuel 17:37, as in English.
A member of a group is singled out by a last HI, contracted to a mere  
I, as in ISRAELI = ISRAEL-HI and ISRAELIT = ISRAEL-HI-AT, not to be  
confused by the possessive form such as YADI = YAD-HI = YAD-ANI, 'my  
hand'.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Jun 3, 2007, at 1:17 PM, JoeWallack AT aol.com wrote:

> ""Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar_ treats the definite article here as  
> special
>
> but as an example of a category of usage (section #126 q-r). They say:
>
> "Peculiar to Hebrew is the employment of the article to denote a  
> single
>
> person or thing (primarily one which is as yet unknown, and therefore
>
> not capable of being defined) as being present in the mind under given
>
> circumstances. In such cases in English the indefinite article is  
> mostly
>
> used."
>
> The go on to speak particularly of this article in Isaiah  7:14: "H 
> (LMH,
>
> i.e., the particular maiden, through whom the prophet's  announcement
>
> shall be fulfilled; we should say "a maiden."
>
> For  other examples of this class of usage they give, among others,  
> Gen
>
> 42:23; 1 Kings 19:9; Job 9:31.
>
> Harold Holmyard"
>
>
> JW:
> I previously indicated that Gesenius changed his mind about the  
> usage of  the
> Hebrew definite article. In an earlier publication he stated that it
> sometimes was not indicative of a definite object. In a later  
> publication he
> corrected himself and stated that use of the Hebrew definite  
> article is always
> indicative of a definite object. This was an embarrassing mistake  
> for him (my
> guess is he was corrected by the same folks who corrected Origen  
> and Jerome). My
> point here is that support for a related position should be based  
> on the
> reasons  that Gesenius gives (as you have done above) and not just  
> on his supposed
> authority.
>
> What Gesenius is trying to say above in general is a Hebrew usage  
> could be
> considered grammatically Definite in Hebrew while being considered
> grammatically  Indefinite in English. Thus, the use of the  
> indefinite (a) in English could
> be  an appropriate translation. My question here is Specifically,  
> how is
> 7:14 grammatically indefinite in English?:
>
> "i.e., the particular maiden, through whom the prophet's announcement
>
> shall be fulfilled; we should say "a maiden."
>
> It seems to me that to take this as indefinite in English the young  
> woman
> must be unknown to Isaiah and not even determined yet at the time  
> of the
> prophecy. How could this be justified based on the Hebrew grammar  
> and  context?
>
>
>
> Joseph
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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