Biblical Hebrew Forum

[David Kolinsky <hadeesh AT sbcglobal.net>]

Ruth,

It is my understanding that (SH means "to make, do, perform"

Do you think I am incorrect in that?

David Kolinsky

Monterey, CA

---

From: Ruth Mathys <ruth_mathys AT sil.org>
To: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Fri, May 10, 2013 5:21:42 PM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Lexemes and meanings

Karl asked:

> However, in what way is my usage idiosyncratic?

Please let me quote some sentences that I read just last night (in Croft and
Cruse, _Cognitive Linguistics_, 2004, p. 258):

>> The term 'meaning' is intended to represent all of the conventionalized
>> aspects of a construction's function... We will use the terms 'meaning' and
>> 'semantic' to refer to any conventionalized function of a construction.

Notice how the authors expressly link meaning to *function*.  A construction
is the form, and the meaning is the function of that form.

Think about a table.  The *form* of a table is one or more legs with a flat
surface on top.  The *function* of a table is to be a convenient place to
put things on.  Or a train: the form of a train is an engine linking
carriages.  The function of a train is to move people and goods from one
place to another.  These are a couple of examples of form and function.

In language, the form could be a string of sounds, a string of hand/body
movements, a string of marks on paper...  At a different level, the form is
a word, a sentence, a grammatical construction...  But the *function* of
language is always to communicate, to mean.  This thread should be
discussing how a form -- a lexeme and its context -- performs a function --
to create meaning.  To put any aspect of meaning onto the 'form' side of the
form-function equation is so idiosyncratic as to baffle intelligent
discussion.

I came upon a good example of a lexeme which I hope we can discuss in a way
that we all benefit from.  Not an obscure example ;-) but I'm still a
relative beginner so it caught me by surprise.  Normally with עשה I expect
the direct object to be a product, either concrete (e.g. a house) or
metaphorical (e.g. a deed).  So I was a bit surprised to read a sentence
where the direct object was a person.  In this case it wasn't God creating
somebody ex nihilo; there was ל plus a second noun to say what God was
turning the person into.  So the unusual object, plus the change of syntax
in the sentence (the addition of a prepositional phrase), alerted me to a
change in meaning for the verb.  It doesn't have its usual meaning of
creating something out of nothing; instead, it means to change the status of
something that already exists.  Looking in my dictionary, I see that there
is an interesting subset of this meaning.  If the agent is a human being
(not God) and the object is an animal, and the context is talking about
sacrifice, then the meaning is to offer the animal as a sacrifice.  Again,
there is a shift from creating something to changing the status of
something.  Apparently there is sometimes a prepositional phrase to
explicate the meaning of 'use as a sacrifice', but not always.  It seems to
be a technical term in sacrifice contexts.

Karl, I notice that you didn't interact at all with my English examples of
words that change meaning depending on their syntactic context ("She has
class" / "She has a class now").  I hope you will be willing to discuss this
Hebrew example.  How do you account for the different syntactic usages of
עשה in your dictionary?

Ruth Mathys


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