Isaac,
your reading of wa as "then" is pure fantasy with no factual or etymological basis. "And + verb" construct is common in plenty of languages: Semitic, Greek, Slavic, and never translated "then." Your reading of wayiqtol as "then he qatal" relies on two unproven assumptions with no factual basis: that wa is "then" and that yiqtol somehow becomes qatal. Such proposition is unproven and untenable.
My translation of wa in wayiqtol is not arbitrary at all but follows exactly the meaning of waw in every other instance. Waw is always "and" (with variations, such as contraposing "and", etc). Waw in wayiqtol is just waw, as we see from Hexapla; wa is the Masoretic rendering. Therefore, it conforms both to the facts and to the Occam's razor to read wayiqtols as "and + yiqtol."
Before labeling "and he would say" reading of wayomer as "perceptional fallacy", a scholar would have at least asked any Russian speaker about his perception - and get an answer that what is odd to English-speaking mind is completely natural in old Russian. You're pressing Hebrew into the English mould.
Vadim Cherny
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