Verbum 9 Tip 9ac: Guide section: Grammatical constructions

MJ. Smith · July 2021

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Reading lists: Catholic Bible Interpretation

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Grammatical Constructions

This section identifies occurrences of the grammatical construction datatypes e.g. {Section <GrammaticalConstructions I Alef Verb>}^{^[1]} and {Section <GramCon GSharp>}^{^[2]}. It also includes occurrences of {Label Prepositional Phrase}

From Verbum Help:[quote]

Grammatical Constructions Section

Lists interesting grammatical phenomena that appear in the guide’s key passage. Click a grammatical construction heading, such as Articular Infinitives, to see a definition of that construction. Examples of each occurring construction are listed beneath each heading. Click Search for to launch a new Search window for that construction across the rest of the Bible.

See also

• Greek Grammatical Constructions: Dataset Documentation^{^[3]}

I’m a little unsure what constitutes “interesting grammatical phenomena” so I have to rely on the list of phenomena covered. Note that there is a mix of classical grammar, classical syntax, classical rhetoric, discourse grammar (pragmatics) . . . The documentation includes an invitation to suggest additional constructions for the dataset.

Hebrew Grammatical Constructions

Greek Grammatical Constructions

Discourse marker wayehi {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Discourse Marker wayehi>}
Discourse marker wehayah {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Discourse Marker wehayah>}
Immediate significance marker hen {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Immediate Significance Marker hen>}
Immediate significance marker hinneh {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Immediate Significance Marker hinneh>}
Immediate significance marker we’attah{Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Inference Marker we'attah>}
Inference marker lakhen {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hebrew Inference Marker lakhen>}
Prepositional phrase {Label Prepositional Phrase}
Root pairs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Root Pairs>}
Tripartite nominal clauses {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Tripartite Nominal Clause>}
Verbless clauses {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Verbless Clause>}
Weak verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Weak Verb>}
I alef verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = I Alef Verb>}
I guttural verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = I Gutteral Verb>}
I nun verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = I Nun Verb>}
I yod verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = I Yod Verb>}
II guttural verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = II Gutteral Verb>}
III alef verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = III Alef Verb>}
III guttural verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = III Gutteral Verb>}
III he verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = III He Verb>}
Germinate verbs {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Germinate Verb>}
Hollow verbs (waw) {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hollow Verb (Waw)>}
Hollow verbs (yod) {Section <GrammaticalConstructions = Hollow Verb (Yod)>}
Accusative absolute {Section <GramCon AccAbs>}
Apodosis {Section <GramCon Apod>}
Articular infinitives {Section <GramCon ArtInf>}
Asyndeton (clause level) {Section <GramCon Asyn>}
Attraction {Section <GramCon Attr>}
Colwell’s rule {Section <GramCon Colwell>}
Conditional statement (first class) {Section <GramCon 1C>}
Conditional statement (second class) {Section <GramCon 2C>}
Conditional statement (third class) {Section <GramCon 3C>}
Conditional statement (fourth class) {Section <GramCon 4C>}
Connection (clause level) {Section <GramCon ClCon>}
Connection (phrase level) {Section <GramCon PhCon>}
Crasis {Section <GramCon Crasis>}
Dative absolute {Section <GramCon DatAbs>}
Elision {Section <GramCon Elision>}
Emphatic negation {Section <GramCon EmphNeg>}
Enclitic {Section <GramCon Enclitic>}
Genitive absolute {Section <GramCon GenAbs>}
Granville Sharp’s first rule {Section <GramCon GSharp>}
Historical present {Section <GramCon HistPres>}
Incorporation {Section <GramCon Incorp>}
Prepositional phrase {Label Prepositional Phrase}
Protasis {Section <GramCon Prot>}

As with the grammars guide section, this guide section is primarily used when the text raises specific issues. It also assists in language learning by providing additional examples of the covered constructions. This is a strong candidate for building a custom palette and visual filter to highlight the text for the language student.

Prerequisite reading:

Parks, James. Greek Grammatical Constructions Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2015.
Parks, James. Hebrew Grammatical Constructions Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2015.

Resources included:

Bibles with reverse interlinears
Selected common grammars.

Grammatical constructions documentation

For the Hebrew

For the Greek

Title (name of construction)
Description
Example
Search argument (missing in some Hebrew entries)
Reference grammars for further discussion

Section heading bar

There are no settings on the section heading bar; the section heading bar menu has no save options. This is the simple default heading bar.

The heading lines include an expand/contract triangle
- Top level heading names the construction
- Second level heading provides structure name and the preposition (original language)
- Third level heading provides the case of the object of the preposition
- Fourth level heading provides the lemma of the object of the preposition and the number of occurrences of this structure within the selected passage
- Bible reference for occurrence
- Bible text extract for the occurrence with the construction itself highlighted in orange
- A search option for the grammatical construction with a match of all attributes of the label.

The content for the Hebrew is the same except for the omission of case information for the object of the preposition.

Interactions on data

Visual cue	Data element	Action	Response
Heading line	Expand/contract triangle; heading text	Click	Toggles display section between expanded and contracted.
Blue text	Bible reference	Mouse over	Opens a standard popup preview text of the Bible reference in the user’s preferred Bible.
		Click	Opens the user’s preferred Bible to the given Bible verse.
		Right click	Opens a Context Menu
		Drag and drop	Opens the user’s preferred Bible to the given Bible verse in a location of the user’s choice.
Orange highlight	Bible reference in excerpt	Mouse over	Opens a standard popup preview text of the Bible reference beginning at the highlighted text in the user’s preferred Bible.
		Click	Opens the article at the selected reference in a new resource panel.
		Right click	Opens a Context Menu.
		Drag and drop	Opens a standard popup preview text of the Bible reference beginning at the highlighted text in the user’s preferred Bible.
Search	Icon and search	Mouse over	Opens a popup window displaying the complete search argument
		Click	Initiates the search in a new panel for data type (2) or label (1).
		Right click	Opens Context Menu
		Drag and drop	Initiates the search in a new panel at the location of the user’s choice for data type (2) or label (1).

(1) Prepositional phrase construction search

Search argument: {Label Prepositional Phrase WHERE Object Case ~ "Accusative" AND Object Lemma ~ <Lemma lbs/el/αὐτός> AND Preposition Lemma ~ <Lemma lbs/el/πρός>}