B-Hebrew: The Biblical Hebrew Forum

I give up.
I can't read it no more - my eyes are getting bloody.

Chris.
The word שכני (never mind if it is plural or singular) is a Qal participle.

There are three categories.
1. Verbs.
2. Participles.
3. Nouns.

This שכני is a participle in the Qal form.
(Just like you said in your first post).

The word שֹׁכְנִי (singular) is a poetic "suffixed form" of the regular form שֹׁכֵן (שׁוֹכֵן).
This is an unusual form, and therefore, your wonderment about it is understood.

Again, this is a singular form.
I wrote above a few verses with the same unusual forms.
Plus, the verse talks in singular: לבך, השיאך, שבתו, בלבו, יורידני - all of the verse talks in a singular manner.

Indeed, outside of context, the spelling of שכני can be voweled also as this: שֹׁכְנֵי (with tsere+yod).
This voweling would be for the plural form.

In this case, just like the examples I wrote in my previous post, and the verse itself, the participle is singular.
This is the unusual form.

*****
Here is a quick look about the participle's forms.

Singular:
The independent form of a singular participle is שֹׁכֵן (שׁוֹכֵן)
The construct form of a singular participle is also שֹׁכֵן (שׁוֹכֵן) (No Change)
Except of unusual forms that come mostly in poetic text - such as שֹׁכְנִי (with Hiriq+Yod)

Plural:
The independent form of a plural participle is שֹׁכְנִים (שׁוֹכְנִים)
The construct form of a plural participle is שֹׁכְנֵי (שׁוֹכְנֵי) (with Tsere+Yod)

******

Hallo Ducky, Yes, I was just looking through your post again and going through the verses you mentioned. I know I said to Karl that "he corrected me" I did not mean by that, that I was ignoring the fact that this is a participle. I just wanted to clear things up with Karl.

Thank you and try some optrex for thoses eyes. You'll probably need plenty for my posts

I see I should have been clearer when responding to Chris.

ducky wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 8:08 am Chris.
The word שכני (never mind if it is plural or singular) is a Qal participle.

There are three categories.
1. Verbs.
2. Participles.
3. Nouns.

This שכני is a participle in the Qal form.
(Just like you said in your first post).

Participles in pre-Babylonian Hebrew are nouns. They were not verbal forms. That came later, starting probably around 450 BC though probably not completed as verbal forms until about 250 BC. This was under the influence that many Jews spoke Indo-European languages, first Farsi, later Greek. By the late Second Temple period, add Latin. We see it already starting in the book of Esther.

ducky wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 8:08 am Here is a quick look about the participle's forms.

Singular:
The independent form of a singular participle is שֹׁכֵן (שׁוֹכֵן)

When looking at the two different spellings, the question came to my mind, is there a functional difference indicated by the different spellings? Tentatively I’ll put forward the possibility that the spelling without a waw refers to the actor, the spelling with a waw the action. That recognition can lead sometimes to some awkward translations, but my interest here is not translation, rather understanding from within the language.

It appears that the waw is dropped when a participle indicating action adds a suffix. Talk about confusing!

ducky wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 8:08 am The construct form of a singular participle is also שֹׁכֵן (שׁוֹכֵן) (No Change)
Except of unusual forms that come mostly in poetic text - such as שֹׁכְנִי (with Hiriq+Yod)

Plural:
The independent form of a plural participle is שֹׁכְנִים (שׁוֹכְנִים)
The construct form of a plural participle is שֹׁכְנֵי (שׁוֹכְנֵי) (with Tsere+Yod)

Yep, those are the forms I find when reading Tanakh.

Karl W. Randolph.

kwrandolph wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 10:15 pm I see I should have been clearer when responding to Chris.

Participles in pre-Babylonian Hebrew are nouns. They were not verbal forms.

Karl W. Randolph.

Hallo karl,

Out of sheer curiosity Please could you clarify exactly what you mean because a noun is simply a means by which one classifies a thing, a person, or a place. A verb is an action. So how can what is clearly an action in post Babylonian hebrew have been a noun in pre-Babylonian Hebrew. It does not make sense to me. Nouns and Verbs are just semantic categories applied for grammatical understanding, the fact that a given word is spoken, the emphasis on Spoken, is neither here nor there, the meaning intended surely remains exactly the same as was intended by the writer. If a grammarian calls it a participle now but says in the past it was a noun....this seems illogical.

Chris watts

kwrandolph wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 10:15 pm I see I should have been clearer when responding to Chris.

Indeed.
You seem to bring good points.
But if the question uses the term "participle", I think that the answer should use the same term.
If not, it just causes confusion.

Now let's examine the form that is called "participle".
which indeed, as you say, is a noun (or at least has a noun form).
And if so, why "participle"?

But before that, a statement.
What I am going to write has nothing to do with the Masoretes, or with the pre-exile or post-exile or anything else.
Only relates to the pure words inside the bible.
So I'm begging you, try to resist.


Let's examine the Participle...
Basically, we can say that you are right.
The participle is a noun.
How do we know that?
1. It gets a Definite Article.
(מלך - המלך).
2. it's form can change, in the same way of the noun, according to gender (m/f) or quantity (plural/singular).
(מלך - מלכה - מלכים - מלכות).
3. It can come (and change its form) in a construct state in the same ways of the nouns.
(מלכת-יהודה, מלכי יהודה).
And more.

But,
On the other hand, it can also behave like a verb does.
1. Its form is based according to the stem-system.
(There is Participle of Qal, Piel, Hitpael, and so on).
2. In a sentence, it changes its form (m/f, p/s) according to its subject.
(המלך זובח, המלכה זובחת, המלכים זובחים, המלכות זובחות)
3. The participle can get an accusative
(Like 1Sam 1:12 וְעֵלִי שֹׁמֵר אֶת פִּיהָ)
(Of course, an accusative can come also without the indicator את).
(Have you ever saw a noun getting accusative?)
4. The participle has a reference of time, and it can come in any tense, based on the context.
5. And of course - it expresses an action or a state ---- like a verb.
And more.

All of these behaviors are not found in nouns - but in verbs (and participles).

Take a different kind of noun.
Like a house=בית, or a stone=אבן, or an alter=מזבח.
Ask yourself if they can behave like the participle does.
The answer is no.
So what kind of a noun is it, that can behave like a verb does?
It was called Participle.

So if we want, we can replace the participle with the verb without harming the structure of the sentence.
For example, Let's use a verb, a noun, and a participle (let's call it Noun-B) from the same root.
1. Verb: ויזבח (he sacrificed).
2. Noun-A: מזבח (alter).
3. Noun-B: זובח (Qal Participle of root זבח)

1Kings 8:62
וְהַמֶּלֶךְ וְכׇל יִשְׂרָאֵל עִמּוֹ זֹבְחִים זֶבַח לִפְנֵי י״י

Let's make it simpler:
והמלך זובח זבח לפני י"י
That is a full sentence.

I can change this noun-B (the participle) and replace it with a verb without harming the sentence:
From: והמלך זובח זבח לפני י"י
To: ויזבח המלך זבח לפני י"י"
I am not talking about if there is a change of meaning or not,
but only about the fact that the participle and the verb can have the same syntactic essence.

But we cannot say the same thing about noun-A (מזבח).
We cannot write:
והמלך מזבח לפני י"י
Or
והמזבח המלך לפני י"י

It doesn't work.

So, you can see how "Noun-A" is not like "Noun-B"
They behave different.
And therefore, it is categorized as a participle.

And once again, all of these words above, have nothing to do with anything except what is written directly in the bible.
With points, without points, pre-exile, post-exile, with or without the Masoretes.
Just the words the way they are, and how are their forms and how they order.

kwrandolph wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 10:15 pm When looking at the two different spellings, the question came to my mind, is there a functional difference indicated by the different spellings? Tentatively I’ll put forward the possibility that the spelling without a waw refers to the actor, the spelling with a waw the action. That recognition can lead sometimes to some awkward translations, but my interest here is not translation, rather understanding from within the language.

It appears that the waw is dropped when a participle indicating action adds a suffix. Talk about confusing!

Never really got into it, but my instinct tells me that the added W is more of a matter of the stressed syllable and how the word was "played" in the mouth, and not about the meaning.
(That would fit your observation about no W when a suffix is added).
But I think also that in times, it became random thing.
(Never thought about it - just an instinct).

ducky wrote: Sat May 11, 2024 1:42 pm The reason for that is not certain.
I think that most scholars see this as remnants of archaic suffix cases.
(But I guess there are more suggestions for that).
Anyway, the form itself is indeed represent a poetic style.

I just forgot to write here that my thought about this suffix that it is just a linking vowel to connect words together.
I think it fit the fact that it comes mostly in poetic texts.

Chris Watts wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 10:55 am

kwrandolph wrote: Tue May 14, 2024 10:15 pm I see I should have been clearer when responding to Chris.

Participles in pre-Babylonian Hebrew are nouns. They were not verbal forms.

Karl W. Randolph.

Hallo karl,

Out of sheer curiosity Please could you clarify exactly what you mean because a noun is simply a means by which one classifies a thing, a person, or a place.

Even in modern English, a participle is sometimes a verb, sometimes a noun. For example, in the sentence “In that movie, the acting was terrible” though “acting” is a participle, it is a noun referring to how people performed their roles. The synonym “performance”, which is clearly a noun, could be substituted for “acting”.

Participles were a certain class of nouns, sometimes referring to the actor, sometimes to the performance of the action. As such, it became the natural form to use when its use was changed to a form of the verb.

Chris Watts wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 10:55 am A verb is an action. So how can what is clearly an action in post Babylonian hebrew have been a noun in pre-Babylonian Hebrew.

From a change in the grammar. According to Waltke & O’Connor, the grammar of DSS Hebrew (not Bible copies) is tense based, with the Qatal used for the past, Yiqtol for the future, and participle for the present. In fact, the reason it’s called a participle is because its use as a verbal form from that time to the present.

Chris Watts wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 10:55 am It does not make sense to me. Nouns and Verbs are just semantic categories applied for grammatical understanding, the fact that a given word is spoken, the emphasis on Spoken, is neither here nor there, the meaning intended surely remains exactly the same as was intended by the writer. If a grammarian calls it a participle now but says in the past it was a noun....this seems illogical.

Chris watts

Language change is not always logical.

The Indo-European languages are tense based. After the Medes, then Persians, conquered Babylon, their Indo-European language, today called Farsi, became required learning. It along with later Greek and Latin, are tense based. We read too that many Jews slacked off in their learning of Hebrew. Then when they tried to speak Hebrew, they simply tacked Hebrew words onto Indo-European grammar. The process probably took centuries.

Karl W. Randolph.

Hi Karl,

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Even in modern English, a participle is sometimes a verb, sometimes a noun. For example, in the sentence “In that movie, the acting was terrible” though “acting” is a participle, it is a noun referring to how people performed their roles. The synonym “performance”, which is clearly a noun, could be substituted for “acting”.

The "acting" in this sentence of: "In that movie, the acting was terrible”, which you call a "participle", is not the parallel of what is a "participle" in Hebrew.

(Maybe English and Hebrew use the same terms for two different things, but a Hebrew participle would not be placed in that sentence)
(I risk myself and say that in English, it is called a Gerund, and you can correct me if I'm wrong)

And this type of sentence would not get a participle in Hebrew.

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Participles were a certain class of nouns, sometimes referring to the actor, sometimes to the performance of the action. As such, it became the natural form to use when its use was changed to a form of the verb.

I think that here you mix the participle and gerund together.

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm In fact, the reason it’s called a participle is because its use as a verbal form from that time to the present.

I don't understand the meaning of this.
This is just a term.
You can call it -X-.
What is important is the essence.
The two grounds of which the Participle is standing on (noun/verb) is already Biblical.
The frog was an amphibian even before they call it amphibian.

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Language change is not always logical.

What is so not logical about the participle expanded his role?
You saw (hope so) in my previous post about how the participle had a few behaviors similar to a verb already in the Bible.

ducky wrote: Thu May 16, 2024 12:04 pm Hi Karl,

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Even in modern English, a participle is sometimes a verb, sometimes a noun. For example, in the sentence “In that movie, the acting was terrible” though “acting” is a participle, it is a noun referring to how people performed their roles. The synonym “performance”, which is clearly a noun, could be substituted for “acting”.

The "acting" in this sentence of: "In that movie, the acting was terrible”, which you call a "participle", is not the parallel of what is a "participle" in Hebrew.

Which Hebrew do you reference? Modern Israeli Hebrew? Biblical Hebrew?

ducky wrote: Thu May 16, 2024 12:04 pm (Maybe English and Hebrew use the same terms for two different things, but a Hebrew participle would not be placed in that sentence)
(I risk myself and say that in English, it is called a Gerund, and you can correct me if I'm wrong)

And this type of sentence would not get a participle in Hebrew.

In Proverbs there are similar sentences. This is one of those things that I noticed, but because the question was not asked of me before, I didn’t list verses where they are found.

ducky wrote: Thu May 16, 2024 12:04 pm

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Participles were a certain class of nouns, sometimes referring to the actor, sometimes to the performance of the action. As such, it became the natural form to use when its use was changed to a form of the verb.

I think that here you mix the participle and gerund together.

Technically, you are right. So more accurately, what are listed as participles in Tanakh, are either mis-pointed Qatal or Piel verbs (masculine third person singular verbs have the same consonants as Qal participles) or more properly gerunds and nouns.

ducky wrote: Thu May 16, 2024 12:04 pm

kwrandolph wrote: Wed May 15, 2024 11:01 pm Language change is not always logical.

Here I responded to Chris Watts.

ducky wrote: Thu May 16, 2024 12:04 pm What is so not logical about the participle expanded his role?
You saw (hope so) in my previous post about how the participle had a few behaviors similar to a verb already in the Bible.

Here we have to recognize that the Masoretes put in their points according to the grammar of Tiberian Hebrew. Tiberian Hebrew already was a tense based language, following the pattern of DSS Hebrew. So many times they pointed what should have been a Qal or Piel verb as a participle. Also translation into English comes out easiest to translate many participles as verbs (translation ≠ use in Hebrew) because of the different use of the verbs in English. But what about the evidence from pre-Babylonian Hebrew?

Karl W. Randolph.

Hi Karl,

Let's leave for now all of the "big stuff". Not that it is not important and worth a discussion (for both of us), But I'd rather to talk about the subject of this thread, which is the role of the participle.

*****************************************************************

(of course I am talking about Biblical Hebrew).

You wrote a sentence: "In that movie, the acting was terrible”.
I don't see any participle here (when trying to make it Hebrew).
Maybe you can, and I don't see it.

Let's make this sentence simpler and also with a simple vocabulary.

Let's take a sentence: "his reading was good" (or writing, Singing, running...)
(I hope you see it as a parallel sentence to what you wrote).

Can you turn this sentence into Hebrew using a participle?

kwrandolph wrote: Fri May 17, 2024 11:34 am
Here we have to recognize that the Masoretes put in their points according to the grammar of Tiberian Hebrew. Tiberian Hebrew already was a tense based language, following the pattern of DSS Hebrew. So many times they pointed what should have been a Qal or Piel verb as a participle.

Karl W. Randolph.

Hall Karl, maybe you could clear something up, just briefly - mere curiosity really; I read a lot of English from the 16th and 17th Century. The spelling, compared to today, is up the creek and awful, though of course quite correct for those times. However, if I had to copy it for todays audience I would place it in naturally todays spelling. Then you might come along in a hundred years time and say Woah woh!! That is pointed according to Irish English of the 20th century but is not how it should have been pointed, even that consonant is wrong where 20th century has an 'S' where 400 years ago that was an 'F'. I hoope yo underftand what I meen. Surely the primary goal of the Masoretes was to preserve the Meaning not try to emulate archaic pronunciation that they knew could be mis-leading to a modern day 11th century hearer. Then also we have the miraculous testament to their ingenuity because that very pronunciation from the 11th century did not change the meaning of the text for the next 1000 years. we are still understanding it. You can not even say that about some old English from the 5th century AD !!

Chris watts