2010 the causative internal passive in qumran aramaic

8/18/2019 2010 the Causative Internal Passive in Qumran Aramaic

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© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, DOI: 10.1163/147783510X571551

Aramaic Studies . – ( ) –

AramaicStudies

www.brill.nl/arst

The Causative InternalPassive in Qumran Aramaic

Edward M. Cook

Abstract

Although the prevailing vocalism of the Aramaic causative internal passive is thought tobe ‘Hoph#al’, there is some evidence for an alternative vocalism with short /a/ in the firstsyllable, therefore ‘Haph#al’. Theorthographic renderingsof the causative passive in Qumran

Aramaic suggest that the vocalism in that dialect was throughout ‘Haph#al’. Although it istempting to hypothesize that ‘Haph#al’ was in fact the normal vocalism of the stem in allancient Aramaic, it is possible that ‘Hoph#al’ was also used in some dialects. Finally, it issuggested that the vocalism of the ‘Ittaph#al’ stem is based on the ‘Haph#al’.

KeywordsQumran; Aramaic; Causative; Passive; Morphology; Hoph#al; Orthography

The present study is devoted to a consideration of the internal vowel patternof one of the derivational verbal stems in Aramaic, that is, the causative stemin the passive voice, usually referred to as the ‘Hoph#al’.

. Varying Vocalisms of the ‘Hoph#al’ in Aramaic

The internal passive pattern of the causative stem in Biblical Aramaic is the‘Hoph#al’, in which the underlying vocalism of the stem is {u–a}1 (short /u/after the preformative /h/ and before the first radical consonant, short /a/between the second and third radical consonants), in contrast to the {a–i}pattern of the active Haph#el stem: active haCCiC ~ passive huCCaC . In theTiberian pointing of the Masoretic text, the first vowel is realized as short /u/before doubled consonants (as in hussaq , Dan. .) and as short /o/ in other

1) Curly brackets enclose morphemes, backslashes phonemes; italics are used for derivationalpatterns of words, surface realizations of words in texts, and for verbal roots.


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Edward M. Cook / Aramaic Studies . – ( ) –

environments (e.g., hon.hat , Dan. .). When the first radical consonant iswaw or aleph, the first syllable of the pattern is realized as /hū/ (as in h ¯ ubad ,

Dan. .).2 This is the same vocalic pattern used in the Biblical Hebrew causative passive.

There are, however, some inconsistencies to this picture of the {u–a}vocalism for the internal passive of the causative (hereinafter CP). First, the CPparticiples display a short /a/ in the first syllable of the base instead of a short/u/, as in mÃha .h˘ atîn (Ezra .) from the root n .ht . In fact, the {a–a} vocalismfor the CP participle is a feature of all non-modern Aramaic dialects where thevocalization is known. Some examples from dialects with vocalization or otherclear indications of vowel quality:

Targum Onqelos: ma .h.hat (Gen. ., root n.ht ); maqqap (Exod. ., root nqp);ma .h.hl¯ a (Lev. ., root .hll ).

Targum Jonathan: massaq (Judg. ., root slq ); ma .t .tal (Sam. ., root n.tl ); mattak (Kgs ., root ntk ); ma .t #̆ anîn (Jer. ., root .t #n); etc.

Palestinian Targum (Geniza fragments): matqnyn (partially vocalized; Gen. ., MS H,root tqn); ma .hz Ãqh (partially vocalized, Gen. ., MS FF, root .hzq ).

Pseudo-Jonathan: m" .hzryn (Gen. ., root .hzr ).Syriac: ma .t .tar (Ps. .[], root n.tr ); mappaq (Thes. Syr . Col. , root

npq ); maqqp¯ a (Thes. Syr . Col. , root nqp); ma #.tp¯ a (Apoc. .,

root # .tp); maprq¯ an (Ezek. ., root prq ); etc.Mandaic: m’pr " ̌s , from prš ; m’ml’k , from mlk ; m’dk’r , from dkr ; etc.3

Babylonian Aramaic: mahdaq , from hdq ; maps Ãqan, from psq , etc.4

A second inconsistency is presented by the vocalization of the CP of theroot " ty , ‘to come’, in Biblical Aramaic, which occurs twice: h¯ et¯ ay¯ u (Perf.third person masculine plural, Dan. .), h¯ et¯ ayit (Perf. third person femininesingular, Dan. .). Although the /ay/ diphthong in Biblical Aramaic doesnot normally reduce in unaccented syllables, it is hard to see what other

origin the segment /hē/ in these forms could have had, which must haveoriginated from the underlying forms *haytay¯ u, *haytayat . Here, then, we havea second witness to an alternative {a–a} vocalism for the causative internalpassive.

2) There are in all ten occurrences of the Hoph#al in the finite verb in Biblical Aramaic(Dan. . [twice]; ., , ; .; ., , ; Ezra .).3) Examples taken from Theodor Nöldeke, Mandäische Grammatik (Halle: Verlag derBuchhandlung des Waisenhauses, ; repr. Eugene: Wipf & Stock, ), p. .4) Examples from Y. Epstein, Diqduq Aramit Bavlit (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, ),p. .


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Due to its gradual discontinuation, the Hoph#al appears in few othervocalized traditions of Aramaic. The variant readings of Targums Onqelos

and Jonathan and the later Targumim have a few participles displaying a short/u/ in the first syllable, instead of short /a/.5 These may be scribal errors orHebraisms, and the vast majority of CP participles in Late Aramaic show short/a/ in the first syllable.

. The Vocalism of the CP Stem in Qumran Aramaic

One of the last dialects of Aramaic to use the CP stem for finite verbal formswas Qumran Aramaic, where it appears several times in a variety of texts. The

characteristic /h/ preformative of the stem has generally become the glottalstop /"/, but in all other aspects the form, sometimes designated ‘"Oph#al’,6 isconsidered to be the same as Biblical Aramaic.

However, there is evidence that the vocalization of the CP finite forms inQumran Aramaic follows the {a–a} pattern, and not the {u–a} pattern.

The following is a numbered list of occurrences of the CP with finite verbsin Qumran Aramaic, in cave number order. Cases in which the reading is indoubt are omitted.

. Genesis Apocryphon: ., " wd #t , ‘I was informed’, from yd #;. Q fg , " tbt , ‘she was returned’, from twb;. Q fg ., " .hwyt , ‘I was told’, from .hwy ;. Q fg vi., " dbqt , ‘I was caused to arrive’, from dbq ;. Q fg xii., " .hzy " t , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q fg xii., " .hzy " t , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q fg xiii., " wblt , ‘I was transported’, from ybl ;. Q fg xiii., " .hzyt , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;

. Q fg xi., " wblt , ‘I was transported’, from ybl ;

5) ‘Für das Partiz. Aphel mit Umlaut in u gibt es nur wenig sichere Beispeile’, Gustaf Dalman, Grammatik des Jüdisch-Palästinischen Aramäisch (Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs, nd edn,; repr. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, ), p. . Some examples aremǔsq #̄ an, TgEzek . (an error for mÃšaq #̄ an, the passive pa #el participle); muřsan, TgExod. (an error for mÃrašan, passive pa #el participle); mwzmn, TgNeof Exod. . (an errorfor mzwmn); TgPsJ Num. . mwpslyn (a Hebrew loan); etc. Targum Neofiti has the finiteform hwn.ht at Gen. ., a form possibly influenced by Biblical Aramaic hon.ha ¯

t (Dan..); the other Targumim read the Ct stem (Ittaph #al).6) Ursula Schattner-Rieser, L’araméen des manuscrits de la mer Morte , I. Grammaire (Lau-sanne: Éditions du Zebre, ), pp. –.


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. Q fg xxvi., hwblt , ‘I was transported’, from ybl ;. Q fg xxvi., " .hlp[t] , ‘I was made to pass’, from .hlp;

. Q fg xxvi., " #brt , ‘I was made to cross’, from #br ;. Q fg xxvi., " .hlpt , ‘I was made to pass’, from .hlp;. Q fg xxvii., " .hzyt , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q fg xxvii., " .hzyt , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q fg ., " .hzyt , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q a fg ., " .hzyt , ‘I was caused to see’, from .hzy ;. Q fg ., " .hlmt , ‘I was caused to recover’, from .hlm;. Q fg –., " w[b]lt , ‘I was transported’, from ybl ;. Q fg –., " #lt , ‘I was caused to enter’, from #ll ;. Q fg ., " ̌sl .tt , ‘I was caused to rule’, from šl .t .

In addition, a few CP participles are also attested: Q fg i., m .htyn, ‘being caused to fall’, from n .ht ; Q fg ., mmryn, ‘embittered’, from mrr ; Q fg ., mqšyn, ‘hardened’ from qšy ; Q fg i., mȟslm" ,7 ‘handed on’ fromšlm.8

Theuseof waw in the orthography is limited to nos. , , , ,and ,wherethe root of the verb is either yd # or ybl , and the quality of the vowel cannot

be determined, since the waw may indicate a vocalization of /ô/ (derived fromthe segment /aw/)or /û/ (derived from the segment /uw/). It will be observedin the other cases that the short /u/ of the first syllable is never indicated by means of waw . This is noteworthy because the indication of original short /u/by waw is otherwise not uncommon in Qumran Aramaic, including most of the texts from which the CP forms are cited.

Some examples are as follows: Q : lqwdmy , fg . btrhwn, fg .; l " wr .h" ,fg. ., qwš .t " , fg ii., etc.; Q : bhwn, fg i.; kwl , passim; klqwbl , fg vi., ; #wbd , fg i.; qwdmyhwn, fg vi.; qwš .t " , fg v.; etc; Q mnhwn,

7) The h of the word is a supralinear addition.8) Three other claimed examples of the CP have been omitted as improbable or uncertain.The form " r .hqt in Q fg xii. and Q fg xxvi. is probably an inner-transitiveuse of the Aph#el, as in Hebrew, not a passive; the same is true of h.ȟsyw , QtgJob ..In addition, the reading " w .ht , which J. Fitzmyer takes as the "Oph#al of n .ht , at QapGen. (The Genesis Apocryphon of Qumran Cave ( Q ): A Commentary [Rome: PontificalBiblical Institute, rd edn, ], pp. , ) has now been corrected (D. Machiela reads " r .ht , see his ‘Genesis Apocryphon (Q ): A Reevaluation of its Text, Interpretive

Character, and Relationship to the Book of Jubilees’ [Univ. of Notre Dame dissertation,], p. ).


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fg xxii., xxvi , etc; Q a: kwl , fg. +.; qwďs , fg. +.; Q : kwl ,fg. +.; Q : kwl , passim; l #wb #, fg. .; QapGen qwš .t (., etc.), kwmr "

(.), twqp (.), etc.Not only that, but the short u of the CP (Hoph#al) stem in Qumran

Hebrew is most of the time indicated by waw .9 Some examples are givenhere, with no attempt to be exhaustive: hwbdl , QS ., root bdl ; hwǧsty ,QHa ., root nǧ s ; mwšzr , Q fg a–b., root šzr ; hwšlkth, IQIsa a .(root šlk , corresponding to Masoretic hošlakt ̄a ); hwgd , IQIsa a . (rootngd , corresponding to Masoretic huggad ); hw .hb" w , IQIsa a . (root .hb" ,corresponding to Masoretic ho .hb¯ a " ̄ u); mwbdlym, QT ., root bdl ; hwkh,Q fg –: (root nky , corresponding to Masoretic hukk¯ ah); etc.

Since the means of indicating original short /u/ were () available and ()widely used (in Qumran Aramaic, and in Qumran Hebrew for the Hebrew CP stem), the fact that the short /u/ is never indicated in the CP stem issignificant, and suggests that there was in fact no short /u/ in this stem inQumran Aramaic, and that the most likely vocalization of the forms was {a–a}(haCCaC ), in conformity with the vocalization of the CP participles across Aramaic and the finite passive forms of " ty in Biblical Aramaic.

. Was There Ever a ‘Hoph#al’ in Aramaic?

Since the Biblical Aramaic Hoph#al is also not written with waw in theMasoretic text,10 it is possible that the same haCCaC vocalization was originally usedinBiblicalAramaic,whichis,atthelatest,contemporarywiththeQumran Aramaic texts, but more likely stems from a somewhat earlier period. It may have been the influence of the Biblical Hebrew reading tradition that caused theMasoretes, centuries later, to vocalize the Aramaic CP as a Hebrew ‘Hoph #al’. Although it is tempting to argue that there never was a Hoph#al as such in

any dialect of Aramaic, this goes beyond the evidence, and in fact, somesporadic uses of the Hoph#al in later literary dialects, such as the Yemenite

9) For a breakdown of Hebrew spellings of the Hoph #al by verb type (weak or strong), seeMartin G. Abegg, Jr., ‘The Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls’, in Peter W. Flint and JamesC. VanderKam (eds.), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment (Leiden: Brill, ), pp. –, , .10) The same is true of the sole Qumran witness to the Biblical Aramaic Hoph #al (Q fg –. = Dan. .), which is however only partially preserved.


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tradition of Babylonian Aramaic11 and some Samaritan Aramaic texts,12 as wellas the remnants of the CP in the North-eastern Neo-Aramaic (NENA) dialects

suggest that in some areas or registers there may have been in fact a (h)uCCaC or (h)uCCiC vocalization of the CP.13

In the NENA dialects, the verbal paradigms of the past tense are constructedon the basis of the passive participles of the earlier dialects, and the base of thepast causative is muCCiC , generally taken to be a reflex of the old Hoph#al;hence, it is thought, these forms provide evidence of an ancient *huCCaC vocalization. However, as already noted, the older Aramaic vocalization of theCP participle is maCCaC across all literary dialects. The NENA muCCiC ,then, represents either an innovation or a survival of a form not attested in

the literary dialects. This issue is generally not addressed in grammars of theNENA dialects.14

The scanty evidence we have, then, supports the idea of two possiblevocalizations of the CP stem in the Aramaic dialects, diff erentiated by thequality of the first syllable vowel, and that the preferred vocalism in the literary texts may have been {a–a} rather than {u–a}.

Eventually the CP stem fell into disuse, at least in the literary dialects.

One reason was, no doubt, the increase in the use of the Ct stem (Ittaph#

al)for the causative passive voice. The use of the originally reflexive T-stemsfor the passive was a common phenomenon throughout Aramaic. The Gt(Ithpe#el) stem eventually replaced the internal passive of the G-stem, andthe Dt (Ithpa #al) likewise replaced the internal passive of the D-stem. These

11) Sh. Morag, Aramit be-Masoret Teman: Leshon ha-Talmud ha-Bavli (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, ), p. .12)

For instance, concerning the Kahle MS

of Memar Marqah, J. Macdonald says, ‘Hoph#

alforms are more common in K than in any other MS. It is noteworthy that the revivalof Hebrew among the Samaritans took place only a little before the time when K …was written’ ( Memar Marqah: The Teaching of Marqah, I. The Text [BZAW, ; Berlin:Töpelmann, ], p. xxix).13) Theodor Nöldeke, Grammatik der neusyrischen Sprache am Urmia-See und in Kurdistan(Leipzig: T.O. Weigel, ), p. ; Hezy Mutzafi, ‘Features of the Verbal System in theChristian Neo-Aramaic Dialect of Koy Sanjaq and Their Areal Parallels’, JAOS (),p. , n. .14) Geoff rey Khan, in his treatment of the dialect of Qaraqosh, argues that the /i/ vowel of muCCiC replaced the /a/ vowel of muCCaC due to analogy with the preterite base of ‘stem

I’ (the old Pe#al) (Khan, The Neo-Aramaic Dialect of Qaraqosh [Leiden: Brill, ], p. ).However, he does not address the origin of the /u/ vowel.


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replacements took place relatively early in the history of Aramaic, as wefind them operative already in the earliest texts. This in itself must have

created a strong analogic pressure to do the same for the causative axis of theparadigm.15

Contemporary with the spread of the Ct was, in some texts, the avoidanceof the causative passive voice altogether. A study by Charles Meehan showsthat in the Peshitta and the Palestinian Targums, Hebrew Hoph#als wereoften translated by the corresponding Aramaic G (Pe#al) form, especially forintransitive verbs of motion,16 not by the Ct (Ittaph#al). Nevertheless, Onqelosand Jonathan usually used the Ittaph#al to translate the Hebrew Hoph#al,17

and in fact sometimes use it when the Hebrew text does not use its causative

passive at all (as in, for instance, " itt¯ otab ‘he settled (was caused to dwell)’ forHebrew wayy¯ agor ‘he sojourned’ in Tg.Onq Gen. .).

15) The present argument could be applied, mutatis mutandis , to the internal passive (DP)of the D-stem (Pa #el) as well, but finite attestations of the DP stem during an era whenvowels were indicated in the orthography are lacking.16) Charles Meehan, ‘Qal/Pe " al as the Passive of Hif " il/Af " el in Mishnaic Hebrew and Middle

Aramaic’, in K. Jongeling et al . (eds.), Studies in Hebrew and Aramaic Syntax Presented to

Professor J. Hoftijzer (Leiden: Brill, ), pp. –. The insights of valency theory may suggest why the Pe#al stem was sometimes used in lieu of the CP for such verbs. Intransitiveverbs of motion, in the Pe#al stem, are said to be monovalent, i.e., having only one argument(the subject). The causative derivation increases the valency of such verbs by one, rendering them bivalent (subject, object), but the passivization of the causative has the eff ect of removing the added argument. In cases where the erstwhile causative subject is only a weak participant in the discourse, a kind of semantic economy often favored the use of theunmarked equivalent of the CP, namely the active Pe#al.17) Klaus Beyer, diff ering both from the traditional view and the view outlined above,assumes a vocalization h.oq .t .el or .oq .t .el (presumably from original *huq .til ) for the CP perfect

up to and including the period of Qumran Aramaic (‘bald nach Christi Geburt’), afterwhich it fell out of use (Die aramäischen Texte vom Toten Meer [Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, ], pp. , ). He does not discuss or defend this vocalization. It may be that the anomalous consonantal text of the CP form in Dan. . hqymt (from the rootqwm) influenced him in his view of the second syllable vowel, or he may be positing a relationship with the Arabic CP stem, which also has a {u–i} vocalism. In any case, heunderstands forms like nos. –, – above as " .o.hzít , and the Biblical forms hytyt andhytyw as, respectively, " ̄ıtíyat and " ̄ıtı̄w . The evidence cited above may be cited against Beyer’sview as well as the traditional view. In any case, the last segment of the form " .hzy " t (no. above) is most naturally interpreted as /-zay "it/, since aleph was used to mark morphemeboundaries between adjacent vowels or diphthongs in Qumran Aramaic. If that segment

contained only one vowel, it is difficult to see why the aleph should have been written. Inmy view, we should vocalize the form " a .hzay " it , ‘I was caused to see’.


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. The Vocalism of the Ittaph#al

There may in fact be some trace of the ‘Haph#al’ (if we may so call it) in thevocalization of the Ittaph#al stem. If it is granted that the causative passivevocalism {a–a} at some point stood in contrast to causative active {a–i}, thenthe notion of passivity would begin to inhere in the short /a/ vowel of thesecond syllable. As the Ct stem began to assume the passive functions of theCP, it also assumed, by analogy, the passive marker /a/ in the final syllable.The etymologically original vocalism of the Ct was evidently {hit + haCCiC } >hittaCCiC ,tojudgebytheCtoffinal- yodh roots that resisted the encroachmentof the passive ending {–CaC}; compare, for instance, the forms " itt¯ aramû ‘they

wereliftedup’(Tg.Ezek .),withthepassiveshort/a/vocalism,with " ittagli " û‘they were taken into exile’ (Tg.Jer .), with the etymologically original short/i/, retained in the vicinity of etymological /y/. Except for final- yodh roots, thevocalism of the Ct stem is hittaCCaC . It is difficult to account for this vocalismexcept by positing an analogical process based on the second short vowel /a/ of the internal passive, which itself could not ‘carry’ the passive meaning unless itwas the sole point of contrast with the active vocalism. This provides additionalevidence that literary Aramaic operated with a basic morphemic contrast of

active {a–i} ~ passive {a–a} in the causative axis of its verbal paradigm.Edward M. Cook

Catholic University of America emcook @gmail.com

2010 the causative internal passive in qumran aramaic

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