Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear Karl,

It is a pleasure to discuss the Hebrew language 
with you, because  you write in a civilized way 
(in contrast to some list members who attack 
persons and use a bad language, and to others who 
refuse to answer questions about the meaning of 
their parameters). You also write in a clear  and 
understandable way.

You wrote:
>
As I read the above, I understand that you make 
the assumption that the qatal encodes for 
perfective aspect, while the yiqtol for 
imperfective aspect. I read first for context and 
meaning, and I understand both in this verse as 
referring to ongoing, incomplete action at the 
time the statement was made, therefore the 
context indicates imperfective aspect. Therefore 
my conclusion based on this as well as many other 
verses, is that qatal and yiqtol do not encode 
for aspect.

You should try to distinguish between the lexical 
meaning and Aktionsart of the verb and which part 
of the action that the author wants the reader to 
see. English aspects are very different from 
Hebrew ones, and therefore it is correct that 
English examples do not always match Hebrew 
examples.  It is important to connect aspect with 
*verb forms* and not with the nature of the 
action. Please consider 1) and 2) again.

Both clauses indicate that for some time the work 
of Peter continued. Both clauses  show that the 
work occurred in the past, relative to speech 
time, and we therefore know that the working 
period had a beginning and an end.  But-and that 
is very important-in 1), a part in the middle of 
the working period is made visible and not the 
end, and in 2) the end, and not the action in 
progress is made visible. Please consider this 
carefully.

1) Peter has worked.

2) Peter was working.

In addition to the use of aspect, there are also 
other tools that can be used to make something 
visible or make something invisible. In an active 
clause, the agent is identical with the 
grammatical subject. If the author wants to make 
the agent invisible, a passive form can be used. 
Example 1) is active and 2) is passive, and in 2) 
the agent is not made visible.  Randall and I 
disagree in most issues regarding Hebrew tense 
and aspect, but we agree that aspect is a 
subjective portrayal of the action (=a subjective 
way of making something visible and keep other 
things invisible).

3) Jacob gave his servant a gift.

4) Jacobs servant was given a gift.

I will give two more examples.  In  5) we see a 
conative event, and what is made visible, is an 
attempt and not the action itself. The author 
makes this conative situation visible for the 
reader by the combination of the imperfective 
WAYYIQTOL and our knowledge of the world-we know 
that Reuben did not deliver Joseph.

Example 6) is ingressive, which means that what 
is made visible, is the beginning of the action 
and a small part of the following progressive 
action. Again, the author makes this visible by 
the help of the imperfective WAYYIQTOL and our 
knowledge of the world-we know that the temple 
was not finished in one year.

5) Genesis 37:21 "When Reuben heard (WAYYIQTOL) 
this, he tried to deliver (WAYYIQTOL) them out of 
their hands.

6)  1 Kings 6:1 "In the four hundred and 
eightieth after the Israelites came out of the 
land of Egypt... he began to build (WAYYIQTOL) 
the temple of YHWH,"

In my dissertation there are hundreds of examples 
of YIQTOLs and WAYYIQTOLs  where different parts 
of the action is made visible.

To make something visible, and to keep the rest 
invisible is a subjective endeavor. The main 
factor here is the use of the perfective and 
imperfective aspect.

In Norwegian we have the saying: "What is 
obscurely expressed, is obscurely thought." When 
list-members use grammatical  terms, even 
rejecting some of them in Hebrew, and they refuse 
to define their  terms, the only conclusion I can 
draw, is that their terms cannot be defined in 
scientific terms, and that they simply do not 
know what they are talking about.


Best regards,

Rolf Furuli



> Rolf:
>
> Thanks for the long answer. There are some things that I question.
>
> On Mon, Feb 7, 2011 at 3:13 AM, Rolf Furuli 
> <<mailto:furuli AT online.no>furuli AT online.no> 
> wrote:
>
> Dear Karl,
>
> In the linguistic literature, there are twenty 
> or thirty different definitions of aspect.
>
>
> All the definitions of aspect that I have seen 
> still relate to time measurements, just not 
> specifically to tense.
>
>
> How can we know what is the correct definition, 
> or if any of them is correct? The basic point I 
> have tried to stress over and over again, is 
> that we cannot start our study of a dead 
> language with the definition of aspect of our 
> choice.
>
>
> That is true of a study of any language, not just of a dead language.
>
>
> First we need to test the language for tense 
> (grammaticalized location in time). This is a 
> simple test. If the language does not have 
> tenses, we need to find the meaning  of the 
> conjugations on the basis of a study of  great 
> parts of the text of the language. In this way 
> we can find the meaning of the aspects in this 
> language.
>
>
> This last sentence can be understood in more 
> than one way, because of the different 
> definitions of "aspect".
>
> I personally think that the study of Biblical 
> Hebrew has been held back because researchers 
> started with certain pre-suppositions of what 
> conjugations should stand for, then try to pound 
> their square pegs into round holes, i.e. try to 
> make their understanding of the conjugations fit 
> the text, instead of the other way around. That 
> would be as true for aspect as for tense.
>
>
> It is correct that "all action, no matter how 
> brief, has duration." This is at least true if 
> we use an atomic clock. However, in order to 
> find order inside a language, we speak of a 
> conceptually semelfactive or instantaneous 
> action, such as a cough or a hickup. In my 
> dissertation I show that  durativity, 
> dynamicity, and telicity in some verbs represent 
> semantic meaning. But supposed semelfactive 
> events represents conversational pragmatic 
> implicature.
>
> It is important to realize that aspect, just as 
> modality, is not an objective property; it is a 
> subjective viewpoint; it makes visible a part of 
> an action or the whole action. Both aspects can 
> be used with all kinds of Aktionsarts. The 
> combination of aspect and Aktionsart and other 
> factors make visible particular nuances of 
> meaning. The verb "knock" is semelfactive, and 
> "work" is durative and dynamic.
>
>
> No, that is not true. While an individual knock 
> may be semelfactive, to refer to a person 
> knocking on a door, or the sound on knocking, it 
> may also refer to multiple individual knocks 
> collected into a series that is durative.
>
>
> The verb in 1) has past tense (it is not an 
> aspect). We learn that Peter knocked at the 
> door, but it is kept invisible whether he 
> knocked once or several times.
>
>
> It is still aspectual in that, with rare 
> exceptions, a person who knocks at a door does 
> so with repeated knocks, not just one.
>
>
> In 2) we see that he knocked several times. An 
> adverbial and past tense can make visible a 
> particular nuance that only past tense does not 
> make visible.
>
>
> True.
>
>
> In example 3) we see the perfective aspect, and 
> it signals that that the knocking is completed. 
> But we do not know whether Peter knocked once or 
> several times (Please remember that English 
> aspects are different from Hebrew ones).
>
>
> Not in English, as it can be open ended, i.e. 
> referring to repeated actions that are not 
> completed. We need more context to say 
> definitely that this is a perfective aspect of 
> completed action.
>
>
>  Example 4) is imperfective, The combination of 
> the imperfective aspect and a semelfactive verb 
> causes an iterative interpretation. Moreover, we 
> learn that at speech time the knocking was not 
> completed.
>
>
> As in example 3), we need more context.
>
>
> 1) Peter knocked at the door.
>
> 2) Peter knocked at the door for an hour.
>
> 3) Peter has knocked at the door.
>
> 4)  Peter was knocking at the door.
>
> Example 7) is perfective, and we learn that the work was completed.
>
>
> Again, as in example 3), context can make it 
> imperfective and continuing through the present.
>
>
> Example 9). The adverbial shows that the event 
> was completed, but the focus is on the event in 
> progress, and the end is not made visible.
>
>
> The tense is past, but that it refers to a 
> durative event, therefore imperfective.
>
>
> Example 10) is used to show that our knowledge 
> of the world also may contribute to the 
> interpretation of a clause. Because we know that 
> The New York Times is published every day, the 
> most likely interpretation is that Peter read 
> the paper every day.
>
> 7) Peter has worked.
>
> 9) Yesterday Peter was working in the garden.
>
> 10) Last year Peter read the New York Times.
>
> The use of the English aspects are much more 
> restricted than the use of the Hebrew aspects.
>
>
> This is the problem connected with your frequent 
> English examples, that they often do not map 
> accurately onto Biblical Hebrew. Rather they are 
> often irrelevant.
>
>
> But the examples show that also English aspects 
> make something visible and other things 
> invisible.
>
>
> How is that? As far as I can see, aspect adds 
> detail to add to that given by tense. So how 
> does it make things invisible?
>
>
> Both aspects can be used with verbs in all kinds 
> of Aktionsarts.  When I now discuss your 
> examples, please keep in mind that aspects are 
> not objective properties. The aspects are more 
> like peepholes, through which we can see a part 
> of the event or the whole event. Durativity, on 
> the other hand, is an objective property, and it 
> has nothing to do with aspect. This means that 
> both aspects can express instantaneous events 
> and events in progress.
>
>
> Genesis 1:3 "light came into existence"
>
> The verb HYH can both be stative and fientive, 
> but often it has the sense "to become" rather 
> than "to be."
>
> Š
>
> Numbers 3:13 "on the day I struck down all the 
> firstborn in Egypt" (literally "on day to strike 
> down I all firstborn in land Egypt")
>
>
> How about "in the day I caused to be struck down 
> all the first born in Egypt"? This is a 
> perfective aspect expressed by the context of a 
> completed action.
>
> What I point to is that the aspect is carried by 
> the context, not the conjugation of the verb. 
> The same with tense.
>
>
> The imperfective aspect in Hebrew makes visible 
> a small part of progressive action. Applied to 
> Genesis 1:3, the imperfective WAYYIQTOL simply 
> makes visible a part of the 
> "coming-into-existence" event (just as did the 
> infinitive in Numbers 3:13), and our 
> understanding that the event is past and 
> completed is based on the conjunction WAW, 
> prefixed to HYH, the Aktionsart of HYH, and the 
> context.
>
> VERY IMPORTANT: Do not confuse Aktionsart and 
> aspect! Do not confuse the objective nature of 
> the event and what is made visible of it by the 
> use of the aspect.
>
> Then to your next example.
>
>
> Exodus 3:7 "I have heard... I have seen... I know"
>
> To" know" is a state,
>
>
> Not at all, it is an action. One must act to 
> know. Knowledge is acquired through other 
> actions, but it is still an action in itself, an 
> action in that it acknowledges that the other 
> actions imparted knowledge.
>
>
> but in this context "to hear" and "to see" must 
> be taken as fientive verbs. A state is durative, 
> but it is not dynamic; I am aware of only one 
> state that is telic, namely, "be pregnant." Any 
> part of a state is similar to any other part, or 
> to the state as a whole. To "see" and "hear" as 
> fientive verbs are durative and dynamic. What is 
> made visible by the three perfective verbs?
>
>
>
> An imperfective verb tend to make visible a 
> small part of the action with details visible, 
> while the perfective aspect tend to make a 
> bigger part of the action visible, or the whole 
> action, but without details.
>
>
> I don't see this distinction carried out by the 
> Biblical Hebrew conjugation system. Nor for any 
> system. Aspect is but one detail among many to 
> build up a total picture.
>
>
>  At speech time God "knew," and after that he 
> did not stop to know. What is made visible, is a 
> great part of the state of knowing, up to speech 
> time; his continued knowledge after that is not 
> made visible. I would take "I have heard" and "I 
> have seen" as making visible the whole events of 
> hearing and seeing up to speech time. The 
> perfective aspect does not make visible the 
> details of the hearing and seeing, but only the 
> broad situations themselves.
>
>
> As I read the above, I understand that you make 
> the assumption that the qatal encodes for 
> perfective aspect, while the yiqtol for 
> imperfective aspect. I read first for context 
> and meaning, and I understand both in this verse 
> as referring to ongoing, incomplete action at 
> the time the statement was made, therefore the 
> context indicates imperfective aspect. Therefore 
> my conclusion based on this as well as many 
> other verses, is that qatal and yiqtol do not 
> encode for aspect.
>
>
> AGAIN: Ignore the Aktionsart of the verbs, and 
> ask what is made visible by the aspects.
>
>
> I am looking at the context, and the context 
> indicates that this example is of the 
> imperfective aspect. Again, the aspect is 
> indicated by the context, not the verbal 
> conjugation.
>
>
> Š
> Best regards,
>
> Rolf Furuli
>
> Karl W. Randolph.