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Negative commands
Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2023 12:37 am
by kwrandolph
What is the grammatical format of negative commends in Tanakh? The imperative is used for positive commands “You shall …” but is it ever used for a negative command “You shall NOT …”?
The question came up in response to another forum where negative commands were translated as “You should not …” because the Hebrew text uses the Yiqtol verb for negative commands in that passage. Do negative commands always use Yiqtol verbs? At the moment, I can’t think of any exceptions.
Karl W. Randolph.
Re: Negative commands
Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2023 6:01 pm
by Jason Hare
You’re correct that there is no specific form of imperative with the negative. The second-person yiqtol serves to form negative commands.
However, we see two different negations: אַל ʾal telling someone not to do something (“Don’t do that!”) and לֹא lōʾ setting out a general prohibition that everyone is expected to uphold (“You shall not do that!”).
For the jussive, we see both אַל ʾal and בַּל bal used in basically the same sense, though the latter is apparently a poetic form. (“Let/may this not happen!”)
Re: Negative commands
Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2023 6:15 pm
by Jason Hare
Here’s the HALOT entry for בַּל:
I בַּל (ca. 50 ×): בלה; MHb.; Arm. GnAp. 2:25; Ug. bl I (UMGl. 324, blmt non-dying (sbst.), blmlk non-king; also positive, as Latin nonne, Goetze Fschr. Pedersen 12326), Ph. בל (Friedrich §249, 1); Akk. balu, balī without; Nab. Palm. and Ḥatra well then, DISO 36; Arb. bal preceding a correction: no (Lane); Eth. enbala without (Leslau 12); Garbini Semitico 169; < → בְּלִי (Brockelmann Heb. Syn. §52bβ); orig. sbst. > negative, → אֲבָל: —not: mostly in poetical texts, often repeated several times in a short passage: Is 26:10-18 7 ×; 33:20-24 7 ×; Ps 10:4-18 5 ×; a) with pf. בַּל פָּֽרְשׁוּ Is 33:23, אַף בַּל נִטָּֽעוּ 40:24; —b) with impf. (52 ×) בַּל אֶמּוֹט Ps 30:7, with מוט 16 ×; with modal meaning בַּל יָקוּמוּ they shall not rise Is 14:21, begging Ps 119:121, cj. בַּל תִּשָּׂא Hos 14:3, so that … not Ps 78:44; וּבַל … אַל Ps 141:4; —c) in nominal sentences Pr 23:7 24:23; ? Ps 16:2 (:: alt. as II); —d) not yet, hardly Is 40:24 (Albright JCS 2:240, → לֹא); —? Pr 14:7; Ps 16:2f rd. בְּלִיַּעַל כָּל־קְדֹשִׁים for בַּל־עָלֶיךָ לִקְ׳, → II.
Der. אֲבָל, בְּלִיַּעַל (?), בַּלְעֲדֵי.
Ludwig Koehler et al., The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994–2000), 131.