21st Century Bible Hebrew -- progressive habitual

Genesis 1:12

 

יב וַתּוֹצֵא הָאָרֶץ דֶּשֶׁא עֵשֶׂב מַזְרִיעַ זֶרַע לְמִינֵהוּ וְעֵץ עֹשֶׂה־פְּרִי אֲשֶׁר זַרְעוֹ־בוֹ לְמִינֵהוּ וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי־טוֹב:

 

Transliteration: Va-totse ha-arets deshe esev mazria zera l’minehu v’ets oseh-pri asher zaro-vo l’minehu vayar elohim ki-tov.

Translation:     The earth brought out grass, herbs seeding seed of its kind and tree making fruit that has its seed in it of its kind; Gd must have manifested, ki-tov.

Letters in this lesson:

Vocabulary in this lesson:

תּוֹצֵא	brought forth (v)
עֹשֶׂה	make (v)

Here is the progressive aspect of asah. What you see happening in this verse is another use of progressive: what the trees are doing is habitual with them. This is an adjectival use of the progressive, comparable to “the baking pan” where “baking”, a gerund, modifies “pan,” a noun.
 

Plural	Singular	Gender
עֹשִים	עֹשֶׂה	Masculine
עֹשוֹת	עֹשָה	Feminine

Now look at totse. The root is yatsa, but this is partly a hifil; I know that because of the long “o”. However, if it was the hifil imperfect, it should look like the table below, and you will see these forms in later verses.
 

Singular	Plural	Person/gender
אוֹצִיא	נוֹצִיא	First
תּוֹצִיא	תּוֹצְאוּ	Second/masculine
תּוֹצִיאִי	תּוֹצֶאנָה	Second/feminine
יוֹצִיא	יוֹצִיאוּ	Third/masculine
תּוֹצִיא	תּוֹצֶאנָה	Third/feminine

 

You might think that totse would be an imperative but that starts with heh. I will discuss a permissive/prescriptive form in a later verse. If that’s what’s going on here, I suggest that this verse is permitting/requiring the dry land to bring forth plants and that’s why Gd had the seas withdraw to reveal it.

An important verb next time.
 

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