Biblical Hebrew Forum

[James Christian <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>]

Maybe this is because I was brought up in Manchester but the only contexts
I've ever heard the term 'hospitalisation' has been in violent contexts.

But doesn't this just go to show that it is the way a word is used that
defines its meaning and not so much the form of a word.

James Christian

2009/10/10 Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com>

> Karl katav
> >Your answer seems to indicate that qal and piel are merely different
> conjugations, similar to the -a and -e conjugations in Spanish, which,
> other
> than form, have no intrinsic meaning. Do I read you right?>
>
> In some senses, yes, others, no.
>
> Any one verb in a certain binyan will have a meaning(s) 'assigned' by the
> language community through their usage.
> Collecting all of the piels and comparing them as a set, and comparing
> them to related verbs will produce a 'field' of meanings and relationships
> that broadly covers the pi``el but would not allow one to predict what a
> root in a pi``el would necessarily mean.
>
> E.g. in English we have situation-creating "-ize" verbs, like
> 'hospitalize'.
> However, a student of English cannot buy a house and say that they are
> going to 'hospitalize' it, that is, to make it into a hospital.
> Hospitalization refers to putting sick people in a hospital for treatment.
> Because that is how the word has been developed within the community,
> though its specific meanings and limitations were not predicatable from
> its root/source.
>
> The binyanim were used by the language community to forge/create
> certain usages/words. The forms of these usages were fixed by the binyanim
> and the sound system/morphological system of the language. the forms are
> predictable to a high degree. (E.g., shillam, not shillem [except pausal])
> The meanings are specific to each situation and each verb and
> are not predictable from a historical root.
>
> blessings
> Randall
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Randall Buth, PhD
> www.biblicalulpan.org
> randallbuth AT gmail.com
> Biblical Language Center
> Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life
> _______________________________________________
> b-hebrew mailing list
> b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
>