Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

You may equally well ask Why does the masoretic text employ the form  
$ABAR in Isaiah 14:5, but the form $IBER in Ex. 9:25? Do they differ  
in meaning? The answer to this is, methinks, not maybe, but an  
unequivocal no.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Jan 31, 2011, at 6:24 PM, fred burlingame wrote:

> I can sympathize with the physician and the attorney, since the future
> cannot be known with certainty. But here, we are dealing with past  
> events,
> the 1000 year old masoretic text. And yet no one appears willing to  
> say:
> "the masoretic text employs two verb forms "yiqtol" and "qatal,"  
> rather than
> one verb form, for the following reason:  ...... "
>
> It seems to me the reason for it (two, versus one, verb forms), is
> susceptible to both identification and articulation in a sentence  
> or two.