Friday 1 May 2009

Bibliography for the verbal system in Biblical Hebrew poetry

I recently posted a request for tips on resources for this topic to two Internet discussion groups dedicated to Biblical studies: Jim West's Biblical Studies List and The Biblicalist. I've decided to collect their suggestions here, along with what I've discovered for myself. I'd appreciate any updates.

Adele Berlin, “Grammatical Aspects of Biblical Parallelism,” in Hebrew Union College Annual 50 (1979), 17-43.

Peter C. Craigie, "Excursus II: The Translation of Tenses in Hebrew Poetry," in vol. 19, Word Biblical Commentary (2nd ed.; Word Biblical Commentary Nashville, Tenn.: Nelson Reference & Electronic, 2004), 110-113.

Fensham, FC. "The Use of the Suffix Conjugation and the Prefix Conjugation in a Few Old Hebrew Poems," in Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages 6 (1978), 9-18.

J. C. L. Gibson, “The Anatomy of Hebrew Narrative Poetry,” in Understanding Poets and Prophets: Essays in Honor of George Wishart Anderson, edited by A. G. Auld (JSOTSup 152, Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993), 146-47

M. Held, “The YQTL-QTL (QTL-YQTL) Sequence of Identical Verbs in Biblical Hebrew and Ugaritic,” in Studies and Essays in Honor of Abraham A. Neuman, edited by M. Ben-Horin et al. (Leiden: Brill, 1962) 285-86.

See P. D. Miller, “The Theological Significance of Biblical Poetry,” in Language, Theology, and the Bible: Essays in Honor of James Barr, edited by S. E. Balentine and J. Barton (Oxford: Claredon Press, 1994), 221-22.

_____. “Poetic Syntax and Interpretation of Malachi.” Liber Annuus 51 (2001): 55-107.

_____."The Biblical Hebrew Verbal System in Poetry" in Biblical Hebrew in Its Northwest Semitic Setting: Typological and Historical Perspectives (Eisenbrauns, 2006).

Diethelm Michel, Tempora und Satzstellung in den Psalmen, Bonn 1960, § 36 (p. 249).

Cristian Gheorghe Rata, The Verbal System in the Book of Job (Unpublished doctoral dissertation; University of Toronto, 2003).

Silviu Tatu. "The rhetorical interpretation of the yiqtol//qatal (qatal//yiqtol) verbal sequence in classical Hebrew poetry and its research history," in Transformation 23/1 (2006), 17-23.

_____. The Qatal//Yiqtol (Yiqtol//Qatal) Verbal Sequence in Semitic Couplets: A Case Study in Systemic Functional Grammar with Applications on the Hebrew Psalter and Ugaritic Poetry (Eisenbrauns, 2008).

2 comments:

John Hobbins said...

Phil,

Thanks for this. It's an excellent first list. Not that there is any agreement at all among these authors!

Adele Berlin's HUCA article in a revised form is incorporated in her volume, recently re-published by Eerdmans, The Dynamics of Biblical Parallelism.

Phil Sumpter said...

Thanks John. Unfortunately, my library only has the old version. Could you give me the reference for the "HUCA" article?

I'm still struggling to get an angle on this. The approach I find most interesting is Niccacci's, but given that my doctorate is not really about this issue I'M not sure how much time I should invest trying to figure it out. I only need it for one word (Ps 24:2: יכננה)!

Who do you favour?