Hi Karl! I've changed the subject line of the thread.
Thanks for those links to SIL. The aspect definition they offer is along the perfective-imperfect polarity, which I don't think has the explanatory power of the definite-indefinite polarity. Their definition of definiteness is, as far as I can see, limited to substantives, rather than verbs. But let's come back to Prov 31.10–21. You can't see definiteness but I can. Are you associating definiteness with a specific subject, while indefiniteness adheres to an indefinite/generic subject? If so, I can understand why you can't see definiteness, because the subject of the poem is 'a woman'. However, I'm not defining definiteness in this way. That would be tying definiteness too closely to the type of action (Aktionsart) rather than to the way the author depicts it (aspect). You can still have a generic subject (eg. 'a woman') doing a definite action—something that is presented in specificity. I used an analogy before about camera zoom to capture this. A yiqtol is a wide angle view so that you see the action as if from a distance. Think of a distance shot in a film. A qatal, however, can present the exact same action but with different aspect—a more close up view that fills the frame. The actions themselves are identical, but the depiction is different. I think I would agree with you, therefore (shock horror!), that the actions can be pretty much the same, but the change of verb form provides a different angle (aspect!) of the action. In my model of the Hebrew verb, definiteness is not the only category considered. There are three categories I consider: definiteness (definite or indefinite), proximity (close or distant), and complexity (simple or complex). The breakdown of the major conjugations would be as follows: Qatal: definite, close, simple. (eg. he killed, he has killed, he had killed) Yiqtol: indefinite, distant, complex (eg. he will kill, he might kills, he should kill, he used to kill, he kills [gnomic]) Wayyiqtol: definite, closing in (producing narrative momentum), simple (this is the narrative 'live action' verb) Weqatal: takes its cue from a head clause, but is transparent (this really is a Qatal, but the conjunction subordinates it grammatically to something else, while the bare Qatal is independent). In narrative and discourse, where timeframes are usually specified, the verbs can be related to the timeframe to determine when the action occurs, even though the verbs themselves don't tell you this. In poetry, however, there often is no specific timeframe, and as such the aspects convey purely different ways of looking at an action, which can be varied for stylistic variation. This kind of stylistic variation, usually between Qatal and Yiqtol, is the product of parallelism, which specifically looks for stylistic variation as a poetic device. Cheers! GEORGE ATHAS Dean of Research, Moore Theological College (moore.edu.au) Sydney, Australia
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