| 26. Linguistic Exegesis The verse opens with the subject veyoshvehen {וְיֹשְׁבֵיהֶן | wə-yō-šḇē-hên} ‘and their inhabitants’, followed by the idiomatic descriptor kitzrei-yad {קִצְרֵי־יָד | qiṣ-rê-yāḏ} ‘lacking power’. Two consecutive perfect verbs, khatu {חַתּוּ | ḥat-tû} ‘they were dismayed’ and vayevoshu {וַיֵּבֹשׁוּ | wa-yē-ḇō-šū} ‘and were ashamed’, express emotional collapse. The perfect verb hayu {הָיוּ | hā-yû} ‘they were’ introduces a series of paratactic similes: essev sadeh {עֵשֶׂב שָׂדֶה | ʿê-seḇ śā-ḏeh} ‘grass of the field’, vayeraq deshe {וִירַק דֶּשֶׁא | wə-yī-rāq de-śeʾ} ‘green herb’, chatzir gagot {חֲצִיר גַּגּוֹת | ḥă-ṣîr gag-gōṯ} ‘blades of grass on roofs’, and ushdefah {וּשְׁדֵפָה | u-šᵉ-ḏê-pā} ‘scorched’. The prepositional phrase lifnei kamah {לִפְנֵי קָמָה | li-p̄nê qā-mā} ‘before it grows up’ conveys premature destruction. The Hebrew asyndeton intensifies the swift transition from emotional to natural imagery, and English employs semicolons to mirror the paratactic listing and preserve its cumulative impact. |