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THE SUBJUNCTIVE |
EXAMPLE: Ex18-15a Upon COMING to me I advise them of Gods ways
EXAMPLE: Ex18-22a Select reps,JUDGING the people
EXAMPLE: Dt02-12A Esauv WILL BE INVOLVED IN THEIR CONQUEST
BACKGROUND
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One of Rashis functions is to advise us on grammatical rules.
In this posting Rashi presents rules on unusual grammatical forms
for tenses. Recall the fact that there are 3 basic tenses:
PAST, PRESENT, and FUTURE.
THE SUBJUNCTIVE
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Consider the tense of the verb SEE in the following sentences
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Upon SEEING a red light, you stop.
When you WILL SEE a red light, you stop.
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THE RASHI
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The verb SEE in these sentences is said to be in the
SUBJUNCTIVE MOOD. Although one sentence seems to be in
the FUTURE (If you WILL SEE) it is nevertheless, not talking
about ONE event that will happen sometime in the future,
but rather is describing the consequences ANY TIME this
event happens.
THE RULE
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Accordingly,
IF
-- we deal with a COMPOUND sentence
-- describing attributes of an ONGOING or REPEATED activity
THEN
-- we translate this sentence either
------using the SUBJUNCTIVE (WOULD) or
------using a GERUND(Word ending in ING denoting ONGOINGness)
-- & we use either the past or future grammatical form.
THE LIST
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The list below contains about a dozen compound sentences
where past or future tenses seem out of place. Rashi translates
these as either the SUBJUNCTIVE or GERUND
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| VERSE |
TEXT OF VERSE WITH FUTURE/PAST TRANSLATED AS GERUND |
| Ex18-15a |
Upon COMING to me I advise them of Gods ways *14 |
| Ex18-22a |
Select reps,JUDGING the people;you try the hard cases*11 |
| Dt02-12A |
Esauv WILL BE INVOLVED IN THEIR CONQUEST*2 |
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COMMENTS |
*2 The conquest continued for a long time. Hence the FUTURE
(WILL CONQUEST) does not refer to a SUBJUNCTIVE (WOULD)
but rather refers to a GERUND type verb (ONGOING ACTIVITY)
(The ordinary Future, by contrast, refers to 1 point in
time)
*11 Rashis actual language is:
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THIS IS A COMMAND
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This seems to be an error since the verse is translated
as FUTURE(not COMMAND)
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THEY WILL ALWAYS JUDGE
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We can also translate the verse as SUBJUNCTIVE
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They WOULD JUDGE the nation continuously
leaving you the hard cases
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*14 Many other verbs in this Ex18-22:24 are
subjunctive. Rashi frequently used workbook methdods:
That is, he commented on one example and let the reader
fill in the rest. As an exercise you should try and locate
all subjunctives in Ex18-22:24
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