Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Ruth:

On Mon, May 27, 2013 at 10:04 PM, Ruth Mathys <ruth_mathys AT sil.org> wrote:

> The patterns which are clear in Proverbs 31:10­31 can be applied to the rest
> of Tanakh and still make sense, whereas your model doesn¹t fit that passage.
> In that passage, all the verbs are used exactly the same, as far as your model
> is concerned, a model according to European languages. They are with one
> exception indefinite, present tense, imperfective aspect, indicative mood; the
> one exception is subjunctive mood.

I find this last sentence confusing.  Following the thread of Karl's
argument, I take him to mean that the situation being described in Prov
31:10-31 is one that has present-time reference ('present tense'), is being viewed in an open-ended way ('imperfective aspect') and is
proverbial/generic rather than referring to a specific individual
('indefinite').

You have hit three of the things I mentioned, but how would you say modal without using a linguistic term referring to language? 

Part of the problem is using terms like 'indicative mood' to talk about the
real-world (or hypothetical-world) situation being described, when in fact
these terms can only properly be used to describe language forms.  There is no such thing as an 'indicative' situation, only an indicative verb form or construction.

So what would be the action that is expressed by the indicative mood? What terminology would you use?

 

 In other words, the 'indicativeness' exists entirely within the sentence used to describe the situation.  It isn't a property of the situation itself.  Actually, this passage even begins with a rhetorical question, so even the first verb form probably isn't indicative (if that is even a relevant category for the Hebrew verb system).

The first verb would be grammaticalized as a subjunctive, if such a grammaticalization existed in Biblical Hebrew, as I have repeatedly mentioned. Instead, we find the Yiqtol form reused to indicate the subjunctive.

 

 The same is true for perfective vs imperfective aspect.  Even when a situation lends itself to being described by a particular form (e.g. perfective aspect is the default option for describing past time), the speaker usually has the option of choosing a different form to communicate a specific shade of meaning.

Again we find the ancient Hebrews used both the Qatal and Yiqtol in contexts that communicate sometimes the perfective aspect, sometimes the imperfective aspect. Therefore these forms don’t grammaticalize for aspect either.

As for aspect, was that covered by a couple of the binyanim?

It's true that terms like 'present tense' often are used rather indiscriminately.  It is sometimes used to refer to a morphological form,
and sometimes to the temporal reference of the verb.  I wish there were
standardised terms to keep the two concepts distinct, but we're not there
yet.

Anyway, so I don't think it's legitimate to say that all the verbs are
"indefinite, present tense, imperfective aspect, indicative mood".  It is
only legitimate to list the different verb *forms* used (some are yiqtol,
some are qatal, some are wayyiqtol, etc.), give an *opinion* about the
overall situation being referred to (a generic description of a generic
ideal woman) and then systematically relate the various verb forms to that situation.

OK, the situation describes actions that, in other languages that grammaticalize for these actions, would be indefinite, present tense, indicative mood, imperfective aspect. But instead we find Qatal and Yiqtol conjugated verbs pretty much equally distributed, showing that these forms grammaticalize for none of them.

By my own admission, I’ve been away from a linguistic description of grammar for decades, so it’s no surprise as I dredge though long forgotten concepts that I misuse linguistic terms in grammar, so my question becomes, is the above paragraph a correct way to describe what the evidence presents?

The argument seems to be that since the situation is generic and
present-time (or timeless?), the variation of verb forms must be due to
something other than tense or aspect.  The trick is to then formulate a
positive explanation of the variation -- what are the different meanings
that the writer can evoke (using alternative verb forms) to describe the
same general situation?

In any case, why assume that Prov 31:10-31 is generic?

This is not an assumption, rather a conclusion. A conclusion based on reading the passage for meaning, what does the author communicate in this passage?

 

 John A. Cook in "Genericity, Tense, and Verbal Patterns in the Sentence Literature of Proverbs" (sorry, no idea of the complete reference) argues that "... qatal along with the few examples of wayyiqtol in Proverbs may portray past tense anecdotes from which the reader is left to extract a general maxim". Instead of making an a priori decision about the situation being described by a particular passage and then trying to read the verb forms based on that decision, it is just as valid to try assigning particular values to each verb form and then see if the passage can be read meaningfully (is there a genre we haven't considered yet?).

John A. Cook, whoever he is, appears to be trying to shoehorn the data to make it fit his model, rather than using the data to mold his model. But as Rolf and others can testify, it’s not only in Proverbs, but throughout Tanakh that these forms don’t grammaticalize for tense, and this passage among others show that they don’t grammaticalize for aspect either, and only sometimes is the Yiqtol form reused to indicate mood.

Ruth Mathys

Karl W. Randolph.