Dear Gavriel,
The reason why I use the terms "QATAL" and "WEQATAL" is that these terms are found in Hebrew grammars. So, in order to communicate with other people, I use the terms that they find meaningful. However, I see no semantic difference between QATAL and WEQATAL, but I view the WE of WEQATAL as the conjunction WAW, and the conjunction is attached to the QATAL for syntactic and not for semantic reasons.
The conclusion of my studies is that QATAL and WEQATAL represent the perfective aspect and YIQTOL, WAYYIQTOL, and WEYIQTOL represent the imperfective aspect. To state it differently: the prefix-forms are imperfective and have some semantic properties in common, and the suffix-forms are perfective and have some semantic properties in common. Some semantic properties are common for both the imperfective and the perfective aspects, and other semantic properties are different. This can explain why prefix-forms and suffix-forms sometimes are used in a similar way (for the same situations). There are two basic reasons for the choice of an imperfective or perfective verb in a particular context, 1) The requirement of precision, and 2) linguistic convention.
The difference between a narrow and broad transcription (
http://esweb.uzh.ch/jstraessler/transcription.pdf) can illustrate "the requirement of precision." To transcribe a word means to express the pronunciation of a word. This can be done by giving little detail (a broad transcription), or much detail can be given (a narrow transcription). If the requirement of precision is great (the difference in the promnunciation of the letter ”l,” if a vowel is pronounced with rounded lips or not, where in the mouth the articulation occurs, etc), a narrow transcription must be used. Where the requirement of precision is not great a broad transcription can be used. The important point is that a broad transcription can be used to express different pronunciations, because there is no requirement of giving the details of each pronunciation.
In a similar way, both the perfective and imperfective aspect in Hebrew can be used when the requirement of precision is not great, because there are some similarities between the two aspects, just as there are similarities beteween a narrow and broad transcription. We have the same situation in English. Please consider the examples below. Let us imagine that Rita knocked at a door for 10 seconds. Example 1) gives no details; example 2) suggests iterative action without giving details; examples 3) and 4) give the details of the iterative action. But these details are expressed by simple past (which is a tense and not an aspect) and the imperfective aspect. So we see that also in English can the same situation be expressed by different verbs.
1) Rita knocked at the door.
2) Rita was knocking at the door.
3) Rita knocked at the door for 10 seconds.
4) Rita was knocking at the door for 10 seconds.
Hebrew does not grammaticalize tense, and ”completed” as a grammatical term should be avoided. We must remember that the aspects are viewpoints, which focus on a particular part of an action. Both the imperfective and perfective aspect in Hebrew can for example express actions that factually are completed. When the event expressed by an imperfective verb factually is completed, often the resultant state is focused upon. The future action in Daniel 9:27, which was the first question of this thread, could have been expressed by WEQATAL, QATAL, YIQTOL, WAYYIQTOL, WEYIQTOL, and by a participle or an infinitive. Often there is not a requirement of precision in future situations.
gavriel wrote:R.J. Furuli wrote:You cannot learn to understand Hebrew grammar buy translating a few verbs back and forth. We have to deal with the Hebrew data "on the ground."
There are 13,915 QATALs and 6,097 WEQATALs in the Tanakh. As for temporal reference and modality, I give the following analysis:
QATAL: past reference:7,446; present reference 2,505; future reference 965; present completed reference (like English perfect) 2,605; modal 394.
WEQATAL: past reference:357; present reference 240; future reference 4,187; present completed reference (like English perfect) 55; modal 1,258.
Rolf,
Long time lurker, first time poster. I've admired your exhaustive research into the Hebrew verb and been reading your posts for years, my comment/question is:
Doesn't your research seem to support the "traditional" view of Qatal representing completed/past (generally) and Weqatal representing incomplete/future (generally)?
As your data indicated, 72% of the Qatals are past/present completed, and 89% of Weqatal are future/modal. That doesn't even take into account a lot of the other tense data could easily fall into the aspect theories making those percentages even higher.
Thanks for your comments.
Best regards,
Rolf Furuli
Stavern
Norway