Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/334

 or longer duration, were terminated in the past, and hence are finally concluded, viz.:

(a) Corresponding to the perfect proper in Latin and the English perfect definite, in assertions, negations, confirmations, interrogations, &c., e.g. then Sarah denied, saying, I laughed not ......; and he said, Nay, but thou didst laugh ;   Cf. . Also pointing to some undefined time in the past, e.g.  who hath (ever yet) heard such a thing?

Rem. In opposition to this express use of the perfect to emphasize the completion of an event, the imperfect is not infrequently used to emphasize that which is still future, e.g. as I was  with Moses, so will I be  with thee;, , , , , ,.

(b) As a simple tempus historicum (corresponding to the Greek aorist) in narrating past events, e.g. and Abel, he also brought, &c.;  the waters did prevail , &c.;  there was a man  in the land of Uz, &c.; even in relating repeated actions,.

Rem. As the above examples indicate, the perfect of narration occurs especially at the head of an entire narrative (cf. ) or an independent sentence (e.g. ), but in co-ordinate sentences, as a rule, only when the verb is separated from the copulative by one or more words (cf. above  and ). In other cases, the narrative is continued in the imperfect consecutive, according to. The direct connexion of the narrative perfect with copulative (not to be confounded with the perfect consecutive proper, § 112) agrees rather with Aramaic syntax (cf. Kautzsch,, § 71, 1 b). On the examples (which are in many respects doubtful) in the earlier texts, see –uu.

(c) To represent actions, &c., which were already completed in the past, at the time when other actions or conditions took place (pluperfect), e.g. now Samuel was (long since) dead ... and Saul had put away  those that had familiar spirits... out of the land. Both these statements, being as it were in parentheses, merely assign a reason for the narrative beginning at verse 6. Cf. ,, .— (for the Lord had fast closed up, &c.); , , ; and in a negative statement, for the Lord God had not (up to that time) caused it to rain, &c. This is especially frequent, from the nature of the case, in relative, causal, and temporal clauses, when the main clause contains a tense referring to the past, e.g. ''and he rested... from all his work which he had made'' ; ,