Grammar Identification Practice: Roots, Binyanim and Aspect

The grammar route

In Component 1 Section A you read two unseen passages and answer short comprehension questions on each. Then, for each passage, you choose one of two 10-mark routes. One route is English-to-Hebrew composition. The other is grammar identification: you are given forms from the passage and you say what they are. It is marked by the point, so a precise short answer in the right words scores, and a vague one does not.

Three jobs

The specification names three things the grammar route asks you to identify:

How the choice works

In Section A you choose, for each passage, between _____ and _____. Whichever you pick is worth _____ marks for that passage.

Always in this order

Do not stare at the whole form. Ask three questions in the same order every time, and answer each in the specification's own accepted words. This discipline pays twice: in Section B translation, an error of aspect is always counted as a major error.

Match each verb to its root

Name the form

A passage gives you וַיִּכְתֹּב (wayyikhtov), "and he wrote". Which identification is correct?

• Root כ-ת-ב, qal, imperfect with vav-consecutive
• Root כ-ת-ב, niphal, perfect
• Root כ-ת-ב, hiphil, imperfect
• Root ו-י-כ, qal, perfect

Every extra letter has a job

Biblical Hebrew glues small words onto the front of a word instead of writing them separately. The exam asks you to name the job, not just to spot the letter: • וְ (ve) and • הַ (ha) the • בְּ (be) in, with, and כְּ (ke) like, as, and לְ (le) to, for • מִ (mi) from So בַּבַּיִת (ba-bayit) is בְּ plus the article plus בַּיִת, "in the house", and מֵהָעִיר (me-ha-ir) is "from the city".

Match each prefixed letter to its job

Which letter is doing the work?

Select the TWO forms in which the prefixed letter means "to" or "for".

• לִכְתֹּב (likhtov)
• לַמֶּלֶךְ (la-melekh)
• מֵהָעִיר (me-ha-ir)
• כְּמֶלֶךְ (ke-melekh)

The infinitive construct

The third job. An infinitive construct is the "to do" form of the verb, and it almost always carries a prefixed lamed:

What is it doing?

A sentence has a finite verb followed by לִכְתֹּב. What does that usually show?

• The purpose of the action: he did it in order to write
• That the writing happened in the past
• A command to write
• That the writing was done to the subject

The clause the form sits in

You are never handed a bare verb - it arrives inside a clause, and the clause tells you what to expect: - וַיִּכְתֹּב הַמֶּלֶךְ אֶת־הַדָּבָר = "and the king wrote the word". Plain narrative: the wayyiqtol opens it, the subject follows the verb, and אֶת marks the object. - הַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר כָּתַב הַמֶּלֶךְ = "the word which the king wrote". אֲשֶׁר opens a relative clause, so the verb after it describes הַדָּבָר rather than moving the story on. - הַמֶּלֶךְ בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם = "the king is in the land of Egypt". A verbless clause: nothing to parse, because there is no verb at all.

Which word opens the relative clause?

In הַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר כָּתַב הַמֶּלֶךְ, "the word which the king wrote", which word tells you a relative clause has started?

• אֲשֶׁר
• הַדָּבָר
• כָּתַב
• הַמֶּלֶךְ

Work one through

The passage reads וַיִּכְתֹּב הַמֶּלֶךְ. Take the verb apart in the order you practised.

• Strip the prefixes from וַיִּכְתֹּב. Which three letters are the root?
• The stem has no added נ and no added ה, and the middle letter is not doubled. Which binyan is it?
• The form opens with וַיִּ, an imperfect carrying a vav-consecutive. In a narrative, what are you looking at?

The method in one line

Work in the same order every time: find the _____ of three letters, name the _____ it is built in, then state the _____. A prefixed lamed on a noun means _____, and in front of an infinitive construct it usually shows _____.

Write the method

A passage gives you the form וַיִּכְתֹּב and asks you to identify its root, binyan and aspect for 3 marks. Write, in English, how you would work it out and exactly what you would put down as your answer.

• Say which letters you strip off first, and why
• Name the root as three letters
• Name the binyan, and give the clue that rules the others out
• State the aspect in the accepted words, and say what the vav-consecutive does to it