| 20. Linguistic Exegesis The narrative begins with the vav-consecutive verb vatehi {וַתְּהִי | wə-ṯəhî} ‘and she became’, marking a resultant state. The construct eshet shimshon {אֵשֶׁת שִׁמְשׁוֹן | ʾêš-et šîm-šôn} ‘wife of Samson’ establishes possession, and the prepositional phrase le-mere-e-hu {לְמֵרֵעֵהוּ | lə-mē-rê-eh-û} ‘to his companion’ indicates the transfer of marital rights. The relative pronoun asher {אֲשֶׁר | ʾăš-er} ‘who’ introduces a defining relative clause, with the perfect re’a {רֵעָה | rê-‘ā} ‘had been a companion’ plus the suffix lo {לוֹ | lō} ‘to him’, describing the companion’s prior relationship. This construct-plus-relative structure foregrounds causality: Samson’s wife passes to the man previously attached to him. English rendering maintains the construct as ‘wife of’ and the relative clause as ‘who had befriended him’ to preserve both the possessive linkage and temporal nuance. |