Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Dave:

Thanks for the explanation. It still doesn’t make sense.

On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 6:13 PM, Dave Washburn <davidlwashburn AT gmail.com> wrote:

On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 3:26 PM, K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com> wrote:

Ken:

On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Ken Penner <kpenner AT stfx.ca> wrote:

Do the following help?

Joüon §59g: "In the light of Ugr. tštḥwy “she prostrates herself,” what used to be considered hitpa̧ʿlẹl, represented almost entirely by the frequent הִשְׁתַּחֲוָה to worship, to prostrate oneself, is most likely a Hištafʿel of √ חוי."

From where does he get this? 

What you're seeing, both there and in the Jouon quote, is a grammarian trying desperately to figure out what's going on with this unique word. It used to be taught that it was a hitpa`el of $XH with metathesis of the shin and the tau, and no clue why the waw. But as Ken already mentioned, Ugaritic has shown us that the root is actually XWH and the stem is a hi$tap`el. Once upon a time we had a grid of stems with a hole in the middle:

                     Basic             Emphatic              Causative

Active             qal                  pi`el                    hip`il

Passive          nip`al               pu`al                   hop`al

Reflexive         nip`al                 ?                      hitpa`el

Thanks to Ugaritic, we now know what goes where the question mark is. And yes, it only survives in this one word in that language, too. That's an accident of preservation,…

So the evidence is that because the Ugaritic grammar has this pattern, therefore it must be found in Biblical Hebrew as well? Why should I buy that argument?

There’s a lot in that presentation that’s questionable, at least. That pattern does not fit what I’ve observed in Hebrew. It may fit Ugaritic, but not Hebrew.

 

… but I don't really think anybody can deny that the word exists.

No question about the existence of the word, it’s one of the more common words used in Tanakh. The question here is the grammar involved, and the root.

I think part of the problem is the insistance that Hebrew have a triliteral root system. But that’s not the case. There are several biliteral roots (into which lexicographers insert “materes lectionis” so they can list them as triliteral) and a few quadriliterals, and this verb acts like a well-behaved quadriliteral with a heh final.

--
Dave Washburn

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Karl W. Randolph.