Tsumura (2007) Samuel (NICOT) Introduction: Literary Structure & Theology.pdf (original) (raw)
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Journal for Semitics 22/2 (2013) 523-537; ISSN 1013-8471
In the book of Samuel, scholars have identified several instances of embedded information as parenthetical structures. Parenthesis is generally defined to include material that is to be deemphasized or that normally does not fit into the flow of the text but is nevertheless included. It has also been found that parentheticals rarely constitute the main subject of monographs. This study seeks to demonstrate how, in the first book of Samuel, the repeated mention of פֹוד' 'אֵ as added information; sometimes in disrupting settings or as leading entity in the storyline, becomes a shared symbol to communicate the mental matrix of the narrative's inner-biblical exegesis.
Old Testament Essays
In the study of inner-biblical quotations in Old Testament narrative literature, much insight can be gleaned from the scholarly endeavour in the last twenty years of defining and interpreting allusions and quotations in the prophetic literature. Author-intended quotations from a precursor text should be distinguished from stock phrases and the use of recurrent identical phrases. Among the viable criteria for discerning the direction of dependence in quotations, it is relevant to mention unfamiliar language usage in one part of the parallel, dependence on context, and signs of interpretation for rhetorical purposes. These criteria are used to test the case of the parallel locutions in Deut 25:17-19 and 1 Sam 15:2-3. The article also stresses the need for a thorough study of repeated phraseology in the narrative literature. Keywords: Direction of Dependence, Formulaic Language, Method, Quotation, Verbal Parallels
Textual Corruptions, or Linguistic Phenomena? The Cases in 2 Samuel (MT)
Vetus Testamentum, 2014
The MT of the Books of Samuel has usually been taken as textually corrupt due to scribal errors. However, many often advocated textual emendations can be seen as unnecessary when one understands the linguistic nature of the unusual forms. Some of the cases in 2 Samuel may be explained as phonetic spellings, such as omission of aleph (e.g. 20:5, 9), assimilations (e.g. 5:13a; 13:16; 18:3, 12), metathesis (20:14; 22:46), and sandhi (22:40; 23:9, 20, 21). Another example is aposiopesis in direct speech (13:16; also 1 Sam 1:22). Furthermore, new understandings of linguistic phenomena such as the “vertical grammar” of poetic parallelism (Ps 18:11; cf. 2 Sam 22:12) and discourse grammar, especially the sequence of the verbal forms in Hebrew narrative prose (e.g. 2 Sam 4:5-7) can aid analysis.
Masters Thesis (Regent College Vancouver), 2000
This thesis endeavors to describe as fully as possible the intra-sentential linguistic features of Biblical Hebrew as found in 2 Samuel 11-12, from the perspective of Functional Grammar as formulated by Simon Dik. After an overview of Dik’s theory, the definitions and formal notation of the semantic functions relevant to each layer of the clause are presented. These layers are built up according to the “bottom-up” analysis of Functional Grammar. The first layer of description is the nuclear predication and since this layer is so important, three chapters are devoted to it. Subsequent chapters cover the core predication, the extended predication, the proposition, and, finally, the illocution. In addition, syntactic and pragmatic functions are included in the description. At each stage, further refinements are introduced into the description, both of the words as stored in the Lexicon (Appendix 1) and of the representations of the underlying semantic structures of the clauses (Appendix 2). In these descriptive chapters, several important issues concerning Hebrew are necessarily addressed to describe adequately the semantic functions of 2 Samuel 11-12. The four most substantial arguments presented are that (1) 'et functions to mark fully Affected terms; (2) terms governed by a noun in construct and non-argument pronominal suffixes are related to their head by the semantic function of Associated; (3) the perfective/imperfective aspectual opposition is not grammaticized in Biblical Hebrew; and (4) the four major verb forms: wayyiqtol, qatal, yiqtol, and weqatal, grammaticize tense distinctions of past, anterior, non-past, and non-anterior, respectively. The analysis chapter is devoted to analyzing how the semantic representations that have been described can be mapped onto the actual linguistic forms of the text, concentrating mostly on the correct linear placement of constituents (traditionally called word order) and choice of verb form. Two constituent templates are proposed that describe the order of constituents within sentences and their movement according to pragmatic functions and displacement phenomena. It is proposed that the semantic representations formulated according to Functional Grammar contain sufficient information to be mapped accurately onto the surface form of the text, thereby validating the linguistic description as proposed within this theoretical framework.
Samuel, Samuel: Dynamics of Repetition in 1 Samuel 3:4-10
Textus, 2022
This paper discusses the way the repetition of formulas and expressions are treated by the various witnesses to the text of 1 Samuel 3:4–10, the narrative of Samuel’s calling. The paper focuses on the differences between MT, LXX and the Lucianic Text. Repetitions in the text often induce the trained text-critic to check for haplographies, dittographies, homoioteleutons, and homoioarctons among the witnesses, but it will be shown that textual decisions require attention not only to phenomena common to textual copying and transmission, such as textual accidents, but also to literary and narrative elements, especially in a book such as Samuel where different Hebrew forms circulated in the past. It is possible, in case of repetitions, to find in some witnesses a narrative interest in seeing an order or prediction be enacted or fulfilled precisely as foretold.
The MT of the Books of Samuel has usually been taken as textually corrupt due to scribal errors. However, many often advocated textual emendations can be seen as unnecessary when one understands the linguistic nature of the unusual forms. Some of the cases in 2 Samuel may be explained as phonetic spellings, such as omission of aleph (e.g. 20:5, 9), assimilations (e.g. 5:13a; 13:16; 18:3, 12), metathesis (20:14; 22:46), and sandhi (22:40; 23:9, 20, 21). Another example is aposiopesis in direct speech (13:16; also 1 Sam 1:22). Furthermore, new understandings of linguistic phenomena such as the "vertical grammar" of poetic parallelism (Ps 18:11; cf. 2 Sam 22:12) and discourse grammar, especially the sequence of the verbal forms in Hebrew narrative prose (e.g. 2 Sam 4:5-7) can aid analysis.
The biblical hebrew verb system Vol5
1. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. In the present work, the fragmentation hypothesis allows us to separate, in fact, several distinct uses: episodic, gnomic and semi-gnomic. Here we discuss the semi-gnomic uses. Much has been written about the characterization of the polysemic Y. On the one extreme, it approximates a simple future, say similar to its use in modern Hebrew or late Aramaic. On the other extreme we find aspectual, modal and gnomic uses of quite a different character, and attempts to put all these uses under one simple label have proven, so far, artificial 1 . Particularly unclear is the line which separates between the episodic and gnomic uses of It is extremely difficult to classify these sentences in terms of tnse and aspect; however, a clear criterion separates the last two from the first three: the fact that Y appears on a subordinate clause. In fact, a subordinate conjunctive clause in Y is always semi-gnomic and of a parenthetic/exegetic nature, or describes a parallel ac...
Pragmatic Effects of Semantically Redundant Anchoring Expressions in Biblical Hebrew Narrative
2008
Referring expressions (e.g., proper names such as “Isaac,” or epithets such as “his son”) are prototypically used for semantic reasons to track participants, to know ‘who is doing what to whom.’ Epithets can also be used to (re-)establish a thematic relation of a participant to the discourse (e.g. Isaac, his son), anchoring them in a specific way. However, semantically redundant anchoring expressions occur regularly in BH narrative in contexts where a participant’s thematic relation is already well established. What then is the function of these redundant anchoring expressions if it is semantically redundant? Though selected passages or terms have been studied, a systematic linguistic description of the default and marked uses of referring expressions has not been completed. This paper will first outline the default function of anchoring expressions. Next, it will propose that the redundant use of anchoring expressions is pragmatically motivated, and represents a marked usage to acc...