Over the last 40 years, the study of word-order variation has become a prominent and fruitful field of research. Researchers of linguistic typology have found that every language permits a variety of word-order constructions, with subject, verb, and objects occupying varying positions relative to each other. It is frequently possible to classify one of the word orders as the basic or unmarked order and the others as marked. Moshavi’s study investigates word order in the finite nonsubordinate clause in classical Biblical Hebrew. A common marked construction in this type of clause is the preposing construction, in which a subject, object, or adverbial is placed before the verb. In this work, Moshavi formally distinguishes preposing from other marked and unmarked constructions and explores the distribution of these constructions in Biblical Hebrew. She carries out a contextual analysis of a sample (the book of Genesis) of preposed clauses in order to determine the pragmatic functions that preposing may express. Moshavi’s thesis is that the majority of preposed clauses can be classified as one of two syntactic-pragmatic constructions: focusing or topicalization. This meticulous yet approachable study will be useful both to students of Biblical Hebrew and to persons doing general study of syntax, especially those interested in the connection between linguistic form and pragmatic meaning.

Most of the papers in this volume originated as presentations at the conference Biblical Hebrew and Rabbinic Hebrew: New Perspectives in Philology and Linguistics, which was held at the University of Cambridge, 8–10th July, 2019. The aim of the conference was to build bridges between various strands of research in the field of Hebrew language studies that rarely meet, namely philologists working on Biblical Hebrew, philologists working on Rabbinic Hebrew and theoretical linguists. This volume is the published outcome of this initiative. It contains peer-reviewed papers in the fields of Biblical and Rabbinic Hebrew that advance the field by the philological investigation of primary sources and the application of cutting-edge linguistic theory. These include contributions by established scholars and by students and early career researchers.

Shlonsky uses Chomsky's Government and Binding Approach to examine clausal architecture and verb movement in Hebrew and several varieties of Arabic. He establishes a syntactic analysis of Hebrew and then extends that analysis to certain aspects of Arabic clausal syntax. Through this comparative lens of Hebrew, Shlonsky hopes to resolve a number of problems in Arabic syntax. His results generate some novel and important conclusions concerning the patterns of negations, verb movement, the nature of participles, and the gamut of positions available to clausal subjects in both languages.

Thirty years after seminal studies by Francis I. Andersen and Jacob Hoftijzer, members of the 1996 SBL section on Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew gathered to reconsider the topic of the verbless clause in Hebrew. The results are published here, demonstrating the gains made in the interim and providing direction for future research. Contents: Cynthia L. Miller, "Pivotal Issues in Analyzing the Verbless Clause"; Walter Gross, "Is There Really a Compound Nominal Clause in Biblical Hebrew"; Cameron Sinclair, "Are Nominal Clauses a Distinct Clausal Type?"; Randall Buth, "Word Order in the Verbless Clause: A Generative-Functional Approach"; Vincent DeCaen, "A Unified Analysis of Verbal and Verbless Clauses within Government-Binding Theory"; J. W. Dyk and E. Talstra, "Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic Features in Identifying Subject and Predicate in Nominal Clauses"; Takamitsu Muraoka, "The Tripartite Nominal Clause Revisited"; Alviero Niccacci, "Types and Functions of the Nominal Sentence"; Kirk E. Lowery, "Relative Definiteness and the Verbless Clause"; Lenart J. de Regt, "Macrosyntactic Functions of Nominal Clauses Referring to Participants"; E. J. Revell, "Thematic Continuity and the Conditioning of Word Order in Verbless Clauses"; Ellen van Wolde, "The Verbless Clause and Its Textual Function