The Ambiguous Waw in a Narrative Sequence
A student translating a narrative passage encounters the clause וַיְהִי כְּשָׁמְעוֹ אֶת־הַדָּבָר וַיָּשָׁב אֶל־בֵּיתוֹ. The student renders it: 'And it came to pass when he heard the matter, and he returned to his house.' A classmate objects that the second waw should not be translated as 'and' because it continues the temporal clause rather than starting a new main clause. The teacher notes that the first waw is on a form of הָיָה, that the temporal phrase כִּשְׁמֹעַ is a preposition with an infinitive construct, and that the passage has three consecutive wayyiqtol forms. The classmate also claims the infinitive construct with כְּ always signals a subordinate clause that suspends the main narrative line, so the following wayyiqtol must be its apodosis.
1. Evaluate the classmate's grammatical claim about כְּ + infinitive construct and the following wayyiqtol. Which reading is better supported, and why?
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The classmate is partly right and partly wrong, and the distinction matters for translation.
What is correct: כְּ + infinitive construct commonly introduces a temporal subordinate clause ('when he heard'). In such constructions the following wayyiqtol can indeed function as the apodosis, completing the temporal frame: 'When he heard the matter, he returned to his house.' This is a standard Hebrew pattern, and it is grammatically defensible here.
What is overstated: The claim that this always suspends the narrative line is too strong. The wayyiqtol is the default narrative-mainline form, and a chain of wayyiqtol verbs normally advances the plot. The presence of וַיְהִי ('and it came to pass') at the start is itself a narrative marker that often frames a new episode.
Judgement: Both readings are grammatically possible, so the decision must rest on discourse function, not morphology alone. If the passage is advancing a sequence of events, read the second wayyiqtol as mainline: 'When he heard the matter, he returned to his house.' If the writer is framing a scene, the apodosis reading still yields essentially the same English. The student's literal 'and he returned' is not wrong, but the smoother rendering is preferable because English marks temporal subordination once, not twice. The classmate's absolute rule should be rejected; the specific reading is acceptable.
2. The student's translation repeats 'and' three times. Explain how wayyiqtol chains should be handled in English, and identify what the student has misunderstood.
Read the worked answer
The student has confused formal correspondence with natural English.
Hebrew wayyiqtol chains advance narrative by prefixing waw to a prefixed verb form. A literal gloss gives 'and he did X, and he did Y, and he did Z'. But English narrative does not require an explicit 'and' before every clause; it marks sequence through word order, tense, and occasional connectives such as 'then' or 'so'.
What the student misunderstood:
- The waw is a narrative marker, not always the English conjunction 'and'. Its function is to signal sequential mainline action.
- The first וַיְהִי is often best rendered as a scene-setting formula ('Now when…' or omitted), not as 'and it came to pass' repeated mechanically.
- The temporal clause כְּשָׁמְעוֹ already establishes the 'when', so a second 'and' before the apodosis is redundant in English.
Recommended rendering: 'Now when he heard the matter, he returned to his house.' This preserves the sequence, respects the temporal subordination, and reads as English. The examiner rewards control of the Hebrew clause structure, not word-for-word substitution.