Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Randall Buth <randallbuth AT gmail.com>]

I was curious what a former student of mine would say,
who is completing a dissertation on the Hebrew of
Jeremiah,  about Jer 38.9.
So I asked him and I've pasted his reply:

"It's tempting simply to revocalize as we-yamot, which would give an
elegant 'so he should/may die' (cf. the LXX and the Vulgate). However,
the MT as is is acceptable and I take it kind of like I take somebody
in Modern Hebrew saying הלכתי just as he/she is leaving or is about to
leave (similar to a performative in the use of past for present),
something like 'he's dead/dead-meat/as good as dead', in all of which
English speakers use a sort of hyperbole according to which the death
involved is depicted as a fait accompli in order to emphasize the
certainty of the thing. Cf. the targum (the Peshitta has it in the
present tense)."

I would agree with this. Succinct and clear, even mentions the
modern 'tense language' doing something similar.

Incidently, the targum that he mentions
says
kevar mit    'already dead'
and confirms or aligns with the hyperbolic tradition 'has died'
that ends up in the MT.

So if a person wants to work from the MT and to explain
what the recorders of the MT were writing down,
then this verse is an example of hyperbole.

If a person wants to re-point,
they can have a simpler, prosaic volitional reading
וימת we-yamo't "so that [and] he might die".


-- 
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicallanguagecenter.com
Biblical Language Center
Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life