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For many common nouns, the vowels in the construct differ from the vowels in the absolute form of the noun.

tyBe

^{, for}

example, is the construct of

tyIB'Ú

. The root is usually still recognizable.

The word in construct may have a conjunctive Masoretic accent. The conjunctive accents indicate a close relationship with the following word. They may indicate a construct or some other joining of words.

The Meaning of the Construct

The meaning of the construct is ambiguous in Hebrew.

English phrases with “of” are similarly ambiguous. An example is the phrase “love of God.” This may mean “someone’s love of God,” or “God’s love for someone,” or “divine love.” The word God in the absolute state may be a subject, an object, or an adjective. The interpreter of Biblical Hebrew who is aware of these possible meanings can look for indications in the context of the specific meaning or meanings.

English uses “of” constructions less often than Hebrew uses the construct, so translating every construct relationship with “of”

would sound peculiar to an English speaker. It may be helpful to note that, in translating into English, reading the words in reverse order to the Hebrew often produces a translation that sounds more English—“God’s house” rather than “the house of God.”

Hebrew for Biblical Interpretation 78

Suffixed Pronouns

Nouns can take suffixed pronouns. They are the ones you have already learned with prepositions. Suffixed pronouns usually express possession in Hebrew: “my house.” The suffixes are usually attached to the construct form of the noun.

~k,ydEy>

your hands

In addition, the noun may add a helping vowel before the suffixed pronoun.

h;ytÚ,/nB]

her daughters Finding Nouns in BDB

In order to recognize a word and look it up in BDB, you need to know the three-letter root. To do this, remove markers for gender and number, prepositions, and suffixed pronouns. You may still have more than three letters, because vowel letters, prefixes, or suffixes have been added to create the noun.

Often nouns are created by adding vowels to the root.

Sometimes the vowel letters

w

_and

y

are inserted.

Noun Root

%l,m,ø

_king

$lm

aybin"

_prophet

abn

byEAa

_enemy

bya

Frequently

m

, sometimes

t

, and rarely

a

_,

h

_{, and}

y

_are

prefixed to roots to form nouns.

Noun Root

x;Beøz>mi

_altar

xbz

hr"AT

_law

hry

[B;c.a,

_finger

[bc

Nouns in Construct 79 These may be tricky for beginners because the prefixes are similar to common verb prefixes.

In addition, nouns may add endings to a root.

Noun Root

yrIc.mi

_Egyptian

rcm

!ArK'zI

_memorial

rkz

tWkl.m;

_reign

$lm

The observant reader may notice that certain vowel patterns and endings are characteristic of certain types of nouns. The ending

y

_–

i

in the first example is used for the name of a people or land similar to “-ian” or “-ite” in English. The ending

tW

_{– in the}

second example is used to form abstract nouns. The ending

!A

_{– (or}

!

_–

'

) is used for abstract nouns, as in the third example, and for diminutive nouns,

!Avm.vi

“Samson” = “Little Sun,” and adjectives,

!AvarI

_“first.”

Several suffixes may originally have come from feminine endings but came to be used for abstract nouns. These include

tW

_–,

ty

_–

i

_andrarely

twO

_–.

Noun Root

tWkl.m;

_reign

$lm

tyviarE

_beginning

var

There are, of course, other ways letters may be added to form nouns, but these are the most common.

Hebrew for Biblical Interpretation 80

The opposite problem in finding a root is having too few letters. After you have removed all the vowels, markers, prefixes, and suffixes from a noun, you may be left with only two letters.

BDB may list these in alphabetical order when a three-letter root is uncertain or unknown in Hebrew. Some examples are in the following table.

Noun Root

!Be

_son

!b

dy"

_hand

dy

In other cases, the noun may have a missing letter. These are often the same letters that are missing in verbs. For example, with a III-he´ noun the he´ may be present, replaced by a yod or absent:

Noun Root

hn"v'

_year

hnv

ba'

_father

hba

yAG

_people

hwG

Many commonly occurring two-letter nouns are listed by BDB under geminate roots. The name geminate is related to the word Gemini, “twins.” Geminate roots have the same last two root letters. While nouns from these roots are common, verbs are rare and therefore are not treated until Chapter 34.

Noun Root

ble

_heart

bbl

rh;

_hill

rrh

[r:

_evil

[[r

In some cases, vowel letters may represent root letters and therefore are not removed to find the root. Nouns from hollow

Nouns in Construct 81 roots are frequent. In these nouns, the vowel letter is not removed to find the root.

Noun Root

bAj

_good

bwj

lAq

_voice

lwq

A few two-letter nouns are from II-nun roots.

Noun Root

@a;

_anger

@na

hV'ai

_woman

vna

Nuns sometimes assimilate in verbs, but not usually in the second position.

Nouns that come from roots listed as I-yod (including original I-vav) may have a vowel letter after one of the noun prefixes.

Noun Root

hr"AT

_law

hry

d[eAm

appointed time

d[y

tAdleAT

generations

dly

vAryTi

_{new wine}

vry

Finally, a noun may, as in the above examples, have more than one of the above vowel letters, prefixes, suffixes, or missing letters.

When a missing letter might make it difficult to locate a noun, BDB often provides a cross reference, as mentioned before.

The note on page one of BDB is an example:

ba'

_{v. II.}

hba

Hebrew for Biblical Interpretation 82

This means for the word

ba'

“father” look under the second root

hba

_.

Only a few of the most common nouns in the vocabularies and exercises are formed by adding prefixes or suffixes or have missing letters. When you have difficulty finding the root of a noun, you may want to review this summary.

Vocabulary

@/da;

lord, master

ja;

^brother

In document Marco Teórico (página 82-89)