Henry Omonisaye.

Ruth 3:3 the verbal form ytdryw

ytdryw

this verbal form is analyzed thus: waw consecutive, qal suffix form

(perfect) second person feminine singular from the root dry meaning to go down. The ordinary for of the verb which we have now has this spelling tdryw . but we have a yod as the last letter, thus we have a different consonant composition for the some verbal form. This is explained on the basis of ketib (scriptum) and qre (lectum). The consonant to be read is at the margin of the text while the vowel in the text is maintained. The ketib is said to keep the archaic form of the spelling. This means that the form under consideration is thee archaic form of the , the waw consecutive, qal suffix form (perfect) second person feminine singular from the root dry meaning to go down. Gesenius-kautzsch-Cowley affirms that we find the y sometimes at the end of the 2nd feminine singular. Since the corresponding personal pronoun is yT.a; (yTia;). The ordinary form has rejected the final i, but it regularly reappears when pronominal suffixes are added ( 44h). Since this is the suffixed verbal system, the personal pronoun is used for the inflections. The feminine form was originally yTia; as in some Semitic languages- Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic. This form is found in the personal ending of verbs especially, and necessarily, before suffixes. The final i was, however, gradually dropped in pronunciation, it was eventually only written, not pronounced. The y therefore finally Qere T.a;; ( 32h). disappeared. The Masoretes have pointed the word in the text as yT.a; to indicate the

Another instance of the form is in Ruth 3:4- yT.b.k'_v'w> Other instances in the Hebrew bible include: Jer 31:21, 2:33, 3:4,5 46:11; Ezekiel 16:18 6. Naomi is the speaker, she was instructing Ruth on what to do. While in 2:21, we have the form !yqiB'd>Ti it is the prefix form (imperfect) of the qal, second feminine singular; from the root qbd while the ! is a remnant of the old feminine ending in the shorten form that is still found in our text. Here, Ruth reports the instruction of Boaz to her. Therefore found in the speech of Boaz.

The common denominator of these forms is the fact that they are remnants of the archaic verbal endings and they are found on the lips of the older people in the story i.e., Boaz and Naomi both of them instructing Ruth. This might therefore be a deliberate plot of the narrator to present to us the remnants of the archaic verbal forms through the lips of the older characters of the plot. This also indicates that the Book f Ruth does not really belong to the very late Biblical Hebrew Period. Thus, it shares some archaic features in found in the early and classical biblical Hebrew.