Pierre Abbat wrote:
Mmm... Well, at least in Modern Hebrew it is quite well-used, and it's very common in Mishnaic Hebrew as well (cf. the common construction "hu hayah 'omer"/"he used to say...") Now, Biblical references... those are harder to find, mainly because they're not just popping into my head screaming, as they usually do. Um.On Monday 02 June 2003 10:29, Mark E. Shoulson wrote:The tense is currently called "present tense" but it's really a participle (can be used as a noun or adjective) and has an imperfective meaning. I always understood the verse to be metaphorical, that our legs were *standing* (upright/proud/etc) while in your gates. *If* you want to have that meaning (and I'm not saying you should), there's always .o'a. If the emphasis is there, again, one could have lo jamfu cu sanli.I meant the construction "`omdot hayu" as opposed to just "`omdot". The only other place I remember seeing a construction like that is in the Aramaic part, e.g. Daniel 7:9 "chazeh haweit" "I was beholding".
Exod:19:15: "heyu n'qiyim lishloshet yamim"Num:9:6: "vayihi 'anashim 'asher hayu t'me`im l'nefesh 'adam" (this is a better example)
Josh:5:7: "ki `arelim hayu"I could probably find others (this was done by searching for space-heh-yud-vav-space and seeing what sense it made, and giving up after finding three)
~mark