Participle with yud at end

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Kenneth Greifer
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Participle with yud at end

Post by Kenneth Greifer »

I read part of an article that mentioned the existence of participles with a yud at the end and it said it had no effect on the meaning of the word. I think the article was about a few quotes in Psalm 113. I think the words should be translated with "my" and the yud should not be ignored.
113:5 מִ֭י כַּיהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֵ֑ינוּ הַֽמַּגְבִּיהִ֥י לָשָֽׁבֶת׃
113:6 הַֽמַּשְׁפִּילִ֥י לִרְא֑וֹת בַּשָּׁמַ֥יִם וּבָאָֽרֶץ׃
113:7 מְקִֽימִ֣י מֵעָפָ֣ר דָּ֑ל מֵֽ֝אַשְׁפֹּ֗ת יָרִ֥ים אֶבְיֽוֹן׃
113:8 לְהוֹשִׁיבִ֥י עִם־נְדִיבִ֑ים עִ֝֗ם נְדִיבֵ֥י עַמּֽוֹ׃
113:9 מֽוֹשִׁיבִ֨י ׀ עֲקֶ֬רֶת הַבַּ֗יִת אֵֽם־הַבָּנִ֥ים שְׂמֵחָ֗ה הַֽלְלוּ־יָֽהּ׃
Are there other quotes that have this or just this psalm?
Kenneth Greifer
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Jason Hare
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Jason Hare »

This is the 1cs object pronouns. For example, מְקִימִי means מֵקִים אֹתִי. In other words, it means "me." If מֵקִים means "one who causes to rise," then מְקִימִי means "one who raises me up" or "one who causes me to rise."
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Kenneth Greifer
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Kenneth Greifer »

Jason,
I don't know what 1cs means. Also, couldn't you just say "my raiser" instead of "one who raises me up"? The translations of Psalm 113:5-9 all seem to ignore the letter yud for some reason. I thought nun yud would be used at the end of "one who raises me up."
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Kenneth Greifer »

Actually, I think Psalm 113:7 could say "my raising" because I read that the participle could be used as kind of an infinitive or gerund or whatever they call it.
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Jason Hare
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Jason Hare »

Kenneth Greifer wrote:Jason,
I don't know what 1cs means. Also, couldn't you just say "my raiser" instead of "one who raises me up"? The translations of Psalm 113:5-9 all seem to ignore the letter yud for some reason. I thought nun yud would be used at the end of "one who raises me up."
1cs means "first-person common singular." The word "common" means that it can be used with both masculine and feminine.
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Jason Hare »

You're absolutely right that the translations ignore the -i suffix. Sorry to mislead you in the previous post. I was writing at 6:00am.

Davidson parses מְקִימִי as Hiph. part. sing. masc. dec. 3b with parag. י (comp. §8. rem. 19).

If you refer to §8 remark 19, you find the following comment:
Like the noun, it [the participle] often has parag. [paragogic] י appended to the construct state; as שֹׁכְנִי סְנֶה the inhabitant of the thorn-bush, De. 33.16.
Gesenius doesn't use the word "paragogic." Instead, he calls this ḥireq compaginis and writes the following in section 90m:
Otherwise than in the constr. st. the Ḥireq compaginis is only found in participial forms, evidently with the object of giving them more dignity, just as in the case of the construct forms in î. We must distinguish, however, between passages in which the participle nevertheless does stand in close connexion, as Gn 49.11, Is 22.16 (חֹֽצְבִי and חֹֽקְקִי, also in impassioned speech), Mi 7.14 (probably influenced by Dt 33.16), ψ 101.5, 113.7; and passages in which the î added to the participle with the article merely serves as an ornamental device of poetic style, e.g. in the late Psalms, 113.5,6,7,9 (on verse 8 see n), 114.8, 123.1.
In the next section, he says that Ps 113.8 represents a textual error that should be read as לְהוֹשִׁיבוֹ.
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Kenneth Greifer
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Kenneth Greifer »

Jason,
Thank you. I don't know if they are right about the paragogic yud, but it is interesting to consider.
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Kirk Lowery
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Kirk Lowery »

Kenneth,

Just a bit of historical perspective:
par•a•gog•ic
Pertaining to or of the nature of paragoge; that lengthens a word by the addition of one or more final sounds or letters.
adj. -- Of, pertaining to, or constituting, a paragoge; added to the end of, or serving to lengthen, a word.
adj. -- in the Semitic languages, letters which are added to the ordinary forms of words, to express additional emphasis, or some change in the sense.
This was the 19th century scholar's way of saying "I don't know what the heck this is!" Keep this in mind especially when reading Gesenius. The debate over paragogic nuns has never come to a consensus. The term itself is, from a linguistic perspective, simply a physical description of what form it is. What kind of form/function/meaning has never been resolved. Some have suggested "emphasis", others "Aramaic dialectical influence", still others "poetic form", and other proposals. And perhaps a case can be made for some combination. Perhaps not every paragogic nun has the same function/meaning.

Perhaps modern (comparative Semitic?) linguistic methods can suss something out. My guess is that, like so many questions we have of the ancient texts, we simply lack data: additional textual/archaeological evidence attesting to what these things are.

I hope this perspective is helpful to you.
Kirk E. Lowery, PhD
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Jason Hare
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Re: Participle with yud at end

Post by Jason Hare »

Kirk Lowery wrote:This was the 19th century scholar's way of saying "I don't know what the heck this is!"
And that's always been my feeling, too. I'm just like "I don't know why that's there," and then I check the grammar and it says "paragogic." That's hilarious! :lol:

Last night I spent some time with a friend on Zoom reading רוּת, which has so many old forms. It was a joy to sit and think about the paragogic nuns all over the place, how sometimes the penultimate syllable was lengthened, and other times it wasn't, etc. Also, look at that chataf-kamats under the quf in אֲלַקֳּטָה! Chapter 2 is chock full of forms that don't fit our normal paradigms. תַּעֲבוּרִי for תַּעַבְרִי‎, תִדְבָּקִין for תִּדְבְּקִי (paragogic nun with lengthened [unstressed] penult), etc.

It's fun when things are different and don't fit your way of thinking.
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