Biblical Hebrew Forum

[David Kummerow <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>]

Hi Harold,

See a few comments below:



> Dear David,
>
> Here is Ehrensvärd's sixth example, taken from
> Gen 16:7:
>
> (6) The angel of the Lord found Hagar near the
> spring [(YN HM] ("Spring of water") in
> the desert, the spring by the road to Shur (Gen 16,7)
> This was probably a known spring, and in addition,
> it is a case of
> cataphoric 15 reference: “the spring in the
> desert, [i.e.] the spring by
> the road to Shur”.
>
> The problem with this argument is that the
> biblical author would start by saying "by the
> spring of water in the wilderness." Is he saying
> that there was only one spring in the entire
> wilderness? 

Of course not, but it is understandable under Ehrensvärd's analysis, ie 
it refers to a known spring.


I highly doubt it but that's what the
> words would imply. If he clarifies "by the spring
> of water in the wilderness" with "by the spring
> beside the road to Shur," he seems to be
> excessively wordy.

Yes, but how do we know that that's the case? There is a tension in 
language between stating things simply and making yourself clearly 
understood.


 It seems he could have just
> said "by the spring in the wilderness beside the
> road to Shur." A certain indefiniteness can
> explain his otherwise repetitive wording: "by a
> spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring
> beside the road to Shur."

But this does not have to be the case. That's the point Ehrensvärd 
makes. There are in reality such few examples of such usage -- many 
which can plausibility be understood definitely -- that it is 
unreasonable to create a whole separate category of usage for them on 
par with the over 30,000 regular uses as is done in the grammars.


> It seems to me that it is the capacity of the
> Hebrew article to express a generic idea for cases
> where in English we'd use the indefinite that
> allows for a certain indefiniteness (a generic
> quality) to these examples treated by Ehrensvärd.

Yes, but generic use is still different to actual examples like Gen 
14:13 and Gen 16:7 etc.

> Yours,
> Harold Holmyard

Regards,
David Kummerow.