Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/219

 2. As in the case of verbs, the monosyllabic stem of verbs generally takes the vowel which would have been required in the second syllable of the ordinary strong form, or which belonged to the ground-form, since this is essentially characteristic of the verbal form. However, it is to be remarked: (a) that the vowel, short in itself, becomes of necessity long in an open syllable as well as in a tone-bearing closed ultima (except in, see d), e.g. 3rd ''sing. mast. perf., , plur. , but in a closed penultima'' , &c. ; (b) that in the forms as we now have them the lengthening of the original short vowel sometimes takes place irregularly. Cf. f.

Intransitive verbs middle e in the have the form ; verbs middle o have the form, ,. Cf. n–r.

3. In the, , and throughout and  the short vowel of the preformatives in an open syllable before the tone is changed into the corresponding tone-long vowel. In and  the original ă is the basis of the form and not the ĭ attenuated from ă (but cf. also h below, on ), hence, for yăqûm;  for năqôm; on the other hand, in the   for hĭqîm;   (on the Ṣere cf. z);   for hŭqam.

A vowel thus lengthened before the tone is naturally changeable and becomes when the tone is moved forward, e.g. ; so also in the 3rd ''plur. imperfect Qal with Nûn paragogic; (without Nûn'' ). The wholly abnormal scriptio plena of ē in  (beside  in the same verse) should, with König, be emended to ; the incorrect repetition of the interrogative necessarily led to the pointing of the form as  instead of .—But in  the û is retained throughout as an unchangeable vowel, when it has been introduced by an abnormal lengthening for the tone-long ō (as in the  of verbs ).