88 interactive, unit-in-context morpho-syntactic analysis that builds on a full and thorough
description of biblical Hebrew.
5.2.3 A Functional-Typological Orientation
The analysis and description of a language are not only concerned with explaining grammatical features or syntactic structures, but also with exploring the possible
functions these features or structures perform in speech andor in text. Functional approaches share the basic assumption that “language has cognitive and social functions
which play a central role in determining the structures and systems that linguists think of as the grammar of a language” Thompson 1992, 37. Both form and function are central
to this analysis since “one cannot understand form independent of function” Foley and Van Valin 1984, 9. A good example of this interaction of form and function is the use of
active versus passive constructions in many of the world’s languages. One type of passive is known as the “backgrounding passive” which functions “to demote the actor”
Foley and Van Valin 1984, 155, as in the following example from 1 Kings 21:15:
When Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned and was dead, Jezebel
said to Ahab, Pc-vqw3msXa Pp-vqc np Pp-vPp3ms np
Pc-vqw3msXa Pc-vqw3fs np Pp-np
+ 1 E
5
1 Kgs 21:15
The actors of the passive Pual 1 E in this verse are the men who followed
Jezebel’s orders to kill Naboth so that Ahab could take possession of his vineyard. From a functional perspective, analysis of the passive in 21:15 is not merely a matter of
identifying the form as Pual, but rather it involves considering the possible “interaction of linguistic forms and communicative functions” Foley and Van Valin 1984, 21 that may
89 have motivated the use of the Pual form in this verse. From this perspective, one possible
explanation for the use of the passive Pual rather than active Qal is that the passive allows explicit reference to the action done to Naboth, but without giving further
prominence to the thugs themselves at this point in the narrative. An analysis that merely parses verbal forms as Pual or Qal without consideration
of the contextual factors that shaped the author or speaker’s choice of one form or another, is incomplete. As Dik comments:
…a theory of grammar should not be content to display the rules of language for their own sake, but should try, wherever possible, to explain
these rules in terms of their functionality with respect to the ways they are used…. Dik 1978, 2
Many functional models have shown themselves to be effective in the analysis of the world’s languages; responsible study and interpretation of the biblical text calls for
the use of every means at our disposal to understand it. The typological approach analyzes languages as representative members of the
whole set of human languages, comparing and contrasting structural similarities. The typological orientation to language complements the descriptive approach discussed
above as seen in the following statement by Shopen in Language Typology and Syntactic Description:
One must welcome the particular characteristics of a language that make it a unique cultural artifact, and different from any other, but at the same
time, one will understand the workings of the language better, even in its most distinctive traits, the more one knows what languages tend to be like.
Shopen 1985, 1
It is important to notice that the comparison of language features within a functional-typological perspective differs greatly from the type of comparative approach
90 which assumes that one language is superior to another. The purpose of comparison in a
functional-typological approach is to see how the function of a particular item in one language can improve our understanding of the function of a comparable item in another
language. Another important aspect of the typological approach, as expressed by Miller, is
that “cross-linguistic evidence demonstrates the plausibility of our analysis” Miller 1996, 200. Arguments for a particular analysis in one language find support in the
analysis of comparable linguistic features in other languages. As van der Merwe comments:
…to be successful in studying Biblical Hebrew from a discourse perspective, the researcher must also allow imaginative hypotheses to be
formulated on the basis of observations of discourse phenomena in other languages. van der Merwe 1994, 39
Even before the recent development of typological approaches, James Barr in his Semantics of Biblical Language, argued similarly that a “semantic method which is used
for Greek or Hebrew must be integrated with general linguistics as a whole, and must therefore be open to relevant data for semantics of any language” Barr 1983, 25. In the
functional-typological orientation implemented here, biblical Hebrew is perceived and studied as one member of the whole set of the world’s languages. As such, it may have
certain unique features, but it will also share features with other languages. Barr stated that “the isolation of Hebrew from general linguistics tends to heighten the impression of
Hebrew being quite extraordinarily unique in its structure” Barr 1983, 291. Awareness of how other languages function can not only help understand the functions of linguistic
91 items in biblical Hebrew, but it can also help dispel the image of Hebrew as a strange
language.
5.2.4 A Discourse-Pragmatic Orientation
