---
title: "Verbal Valency in Biblical Hebrew — Wilson 2014"
description: "The full text is not in the library (download refused with HTTP 403) and the repository page carries no abstract, so this card rests on the title alone…"
authors: ["James Douglas Wilson"]
year: 2014
venue: "ePlace - Preserving, Learning, and Creative Exchange (Asbury Theological Seminary)"
source: "https://place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/598/"
licence: "Open access (free to read); no CC licence stated — read only (ePlace - Preserving, Learning, and Creative Exchange (Asbury Theological Seminary))"
summary_licence: "Elamur Cosmic License"
canonical: "https://research.elamur.ai/free/en/papers/hbo-2014-wilson-verbal-valency-biblical-hebrew-analysis/"
---
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# Verbal Valency in Biblical Hebrew: An Analysis of the Valency of ʿbr

**Authors:** James Douglas Wilson · **Year:** 2014 · **Venue:** dissertation, Asbury Theological Seminary (ATS Dissertations) **Link:** [place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/598](https://place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/598/) · **Licence:** copyrighted — summary only (free to read, no CC licence stated)

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- [Publisher's page](https://place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/598/)
- [PDF](https://place.asburyseminary.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1619&context=ecommonsatsdissertations)
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**Authors (1)**

1. [James Douglas Wilson](https://openalex.org/A5076852351) h 0 · 0 citations · 1 works

Citations and author metrics: OpenAlex, 2026-10-14; authors with the same name are not always told apart.

## What it is about

The full text is not in the library (download refused with HTTP 403) and the repository page carries no abstract, so this card rests on the title alone and its ideas are provisional. The work is a valency study of a single verb, עבר ʿbr "pass over, cross, go through, transgress", in Biblical Hebrew: which complements it takes (direct object, prepositional phrases with עַל, בְּ, מִן, אֶל, לִפְנֵי), how many, and how the meaning shifts with the frame (crossing a river, passing by someone, transgressing a command, in the hiphil causing to pass or transferring). Such studies usually follow the valency approach of Richter or Dyk and the ETCBC, distinguishing obligatory complements from optional adjuncts.

## Ideas

- I1. Build a valency frame table for עבר from the Torah trees: for each occurrence, the stem, the set of dependents (obj, obl with the preposition lemma), and the JPS verb used ("pass over", "cross", "transgress", "go through"). Clusters of frame + gloss give sense distinctions for the dictionary.
- I2. Generalize: a valency-frame column in the Torah dictionary for the 100 most frequent verbs, derived the same way and checked against BDB's sense divisions. This is cheap and makes the dictionary's senses explainable by syntax.
- I3. A gloss rule: עבר + object/עַל with a law or covenant word (מִצְוָה, בְּרִית, פִּי יְהוָה) → "transgress"; with a river, land or border → "cross"; measure against JPS.

## For Mova

I1–I3 belong to the Torah dictionary (the dictionary builder, [languages/hbo/10-lexicon.md](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/hbo/10-lexicon/), polysemy) and to `08-syntax.md` (objects and prepositional complements). They need only our trees and the JPS alignment; the dissertation, once read, would serve as a check.

## Cite

The paper itself, not this card. BibTeX from the library's record of the work.

```bibtex
@inproceedings{wilson2014verbal,
  title = {{Verbal Valency in Biblical Hebrew: An Analysis of the Valency of ʿbr}},
  author = {Wilson, James Douglas},
  booktitle = {ePlace - Preserving, Learning, and Creative Exchange (Asbury Theological Seminary)},
  year = {2014},
  url = {https://place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/598/}
}
```

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