Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

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Jonathan Beck
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jonathan Beck »

Jason is correct. While the vav consecutive perfect can indicate conditional tense, if you use that form you aren't accounting for the THAT. weqatal forms (vav plus imperfect) also exhibit irreal (everything non-indicative) mood, so I would take Jason's suggestion here.

Jonathan
Jonathan Beck
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kwrandolph
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by kwrandolph »

Jason Hare wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 4:39 pm The hide tag is not there to keep people from having the answers. It is INTENTIONAL that you can click on it and reveal what’s been hidden. The purpose is to allow your eye to scan down the page to start typing your own without accidentally being exposed to someone else’s work—if you don’t want to unintentionally look at it.
Just curious, are those “answers” ones that Weingreen suggests, or are they your personal efforts?

What I do is look at the proposed sentence, make my translation, then deliberately look at yours.
Jason Hare wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 4:42 pm I disagree with ונשב (that is, וְנֵשֵׁב vənēšēḇ) as the final verb form. It should be וְיָשַׁ֫בְנוּ vəyāšáḇnû. This form is what Cook and Holmstedt refer to as the irreal perfect. It is used for non-indicate mood, such as the “that we should” sense. The vav with imperfect can be used as a pure first–person jussive (that is, cohortative) following a conjunctive vav, meaning “and let us dwell.”
I don’t know who are Cook and Holmstedt, nor how good is their understanding of Biblical Hebrew. Is their understanding better than Gesenius who thought medieval Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew were identical?

My use of the Wayyiqtol I see is the same as the final verb in Isaiah 53:2.

Karl W. Randolph.
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Jason Hare
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jason Hare »

John A. Cook and Robert D. Holmstedt. Do you really not know who they are? The text doesn’t say “that we should dwell,” anyway; it says “and we shall dwell.” I don’t see any reason to treat this as a jussive of any sort. There is also a difference between, for example, וְיֹאמַר vəyōʾmar and וַיֹּ֫אמֶר vayyṓʾmer. The first is not vav-consecutive, and the second is... even though both look the same when unpointed (ויאמר).
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יוֹדֵ֣עַ צַ֭דִּיק נֶ֣פֶשׁ בְּהֶמְתּ֑וֹ וְֽרַחֲמֵ֥י רְ֝שָׁעִ֗ים אַכְזָרִֽי׃
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Jason Hare
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jason Hare »

kwrandolph wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 1:00 am Just curious, are those “answers” ones that Weingreen suggests, or are they your personal efforts?
I don’t have any official key for Weingreen. I’m creating a key to it as I go along.
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יוֹדֵ֣עַ צַ֭דִּיק נֶ֣פֶשׁ בְּהֶמְתּ֑וֹ וְֽרַחֲמֵ֥י רְ֝שָׁעִ֗ים אַכְזָרִֽי׃
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jason Hare »

Karl, just out of curiosity, do you see a distinction between וְיִבְנֶה vəyiḇneh, וַיִּבְנֶה vayyiḇneh, and וַיִּ֫בֶן vayyíḇen? What about the same forms built on עָנָה ʿānâ and קָנָה qānâ? What do all of these forms have in common?
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יוֹדֵ֣עַ צַ֭דִּיק נֶ֣פֶשׁ בְּהֶמְתּ֑וֹ וְֽרַחֲמֵ֥י רְ֝שָׁעִ֗ים אַכְזָרִֽי׃
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Jonathan Beck
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jonathan Beck »

Karl, this is the trouble you run into when you don't read vowels. The pointing in the reference you cite isn't a vav consecutive - it's a vav + a yiqtol. E.g., what we have here, וְנֶחְמְדֵהוּ vs. וַנִּחְמְדֵהוּ.

You have no evidence, other than personal opinion or feeling, to dispense with the niqqud. Personal opinion isn't good enough in academics. Arguments require evidence.

Jonathan
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Jason Hare
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by Jason Hare »

To be clear, וְיֵרֵד vəyērēḏ is not vav-consecutive, but וַיֵּרֶד vayyḗreḏ is vav-consecutive. They look the same (וירד), but they are not the same. Indeed, they look the same as וְיָרַד vəyāraḏ. Not reading points causes you to miss so many details and nuances.
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יוֹדֵ֣עַ צַ֭דִּיק נֶ֣פֶשׁ בְּהֶמְתּ֑וֹ וְֽרַחֲמֵ֥י רְ֝שָׁעִ֗ים אַכְזָרִֽי׃
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kwrandolph
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by kwrandolph »

Jason Hare wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 4:44 pm John A. Cook and Robert D. Holmstedt. Do you really not know who they are?
I’ve seen the names, but I have no idea as to their expertise, nor why anyone should consider them as “experts”. Therefore their names are as influential with me as water off a duck’s back.
Jason Hare wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 4:44 pm The text doesn’t say “that we should dwell,”
The context does. Or another way of saying the same thing “that we may dwell in them” which also takes the Yiqtol conjugations. In this context, “may” and “should” are synonyms.

Secondly, this final phrase is a continuation, a completion in this case, of a previous theme. As such, it takes a Yiqtol, very often a Wayyiqtol.
Jason Hare wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 4:44 pm anyway; it says “and we shall dwell.” I don’t see any reason to treat this as a jussive of any sort.
I don’t see it as a jussive.
Jason Hare wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 4:44 pm There is also a difference between, for example, וְיֹאמַר vəyōʾmar and וַיֹּ֫אמֶר vayyṓʾmer. The first is not vav-consecutive, and the second is... even though both look the same when unpointed (ויאמר).
The text was originally written without points. By the time the points were added, there’s no question that the pronunciations preserved by the points are NOT the same pronunciations as were spoken by the writers. Therefore they are not authoritative. Context overrides the points.

Do you have any evidence from before the DSS period, that such a difference in pronunciation existed and was significant?

Karl W. Randolph.
Last edited by kwrandolph on Wed Dec 01, 2021 2:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.
kwrandolph
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by kwrandolph »

Jason Hare wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 8:06 pm
kwrandolph wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 1:00 am Just curious, are those “answers” ones that Weingreen suggests, or are they your personal efforts?
I don’t have any official key for Weingreen. I’m creating a key to it as I go along.
Good!!!

Seriously, I have more respect for your translations knowing that they’re yours, than if they were from Weingreen. But that still doesn’t mean I agree with them.

Karl W. Randolph.
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Re: Weingreen Grammar, Composition 32.7

Post by kwrandolph »

Jonathan Beck wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 8:11 pm Karl, this is the trouble you run into when you don't read vowels.…You have no evidence, other than personal opinion or feeling, to dispense with the niqqud. Personal opinion isn't good enough in academics. Arguments require evidence.

Jonathan
Actually I do have evidence. However it is rather sparse.

We find that the city ירודלם was still pronounced ιεροσολυμα in backwards Galilee in the first century AD.
When we find αββα ο πατηρ in the New Testament, that too is arguably a Hebrew pronunciation.
Several personal and place names in the New Testament indicate different pronunciations than indicated by the points.
The animal לבי was called “labaya” in pre-exile transliterations.
The name עמרי was transliterated on a stele as “Omri'i” indicating that the Yod was a consonant separating two syllables, not a vowel as in present pointing.
The ancient Greeks transliterated יפת as “yapata”, the Romans as “Yupeter”.

If I did a serious study looking for more examples, how many more would I find? But these are enough for me to show that the points don’t represent Biblical era pronunciations. Since the points don’t recreate Biblical era pronunciations, and the grammar used by the Masoretes is also different from Biblical era grammar, how much can we trust the points? I don’t.

As a result, the only thing that counts is the consonantal text. The consonantal text doesn’t indicate those differences that the points indicate, and there’s no evidence that the differences indicated by the points are original. I would argue that it is you who lacks evidence.

Karl W. Randolph.
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