Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Lew Reich" <lbr AT sprynet.com>]

Although the hiphil form usually means "causing an action to take place,"
for some roots it indicates only the simple action.  For this root, the
hiphil form means "destroy" or "cause to be destroyed,"  not "cause to
destroy."  In such cases, if you want to say that someone caused the action,
you have to spell out the concept and action in several words, as one might
do in English. 

Lewis

-----Original Message-----
From: b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of kenneth greifer
Sent: Tuesday, January 08, 2008 10:25 PM
To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [b-hebrew] to cause to destroy


The hiphil form of the verb spelled shin het tav means "to destroy", even
though it could mean "to cause to destroy" (I guess). If someone wanted to
say "to cause to destroy" would they use the hiphil of this verb which was
not used for that meaning or some other verb that means "to cause to
destroy" or is their some verb that means "to cause" that would be used with
the hiphil form of shin het tav? I am confused about hiphil verbs sometimes
meaning "to cause to do something", and sometimes not meaning "to cause to
do something", and what happens when you actually want to say "to cause to
do something" and the hiphil form of the verb doesn't mean that.
 
Kenneth Greifer