Pronoun¶
Summary¶
A pronoun is a word that indirectly refers to a person or a thing. For example: “John” is a proper name, “man” is a common noun, and “he” is a pronoun; but all three terms can refer to the same person named “John”.
Article¶
In Biblical Hebrew, a pronoun can function as a noun (personal pronouns), an adjective (demonstrative pronouns), or a relative particle (relative pronouns).
Types¶
Biblical Hebrew contains the following five types of pronouns.
Demonstrative pronoun¶
A demonstrative pronoun refers to a specific person(s) or thing(s) in particular. In English, the following words are demonstrative pronouns: “this”, “that”, “these”, “those”.
Indefinite pronoun¶
An indefinite pronoun is a pronoun that refers to a person(s) or thing(s) in general but not to any specific person or thing in particular. In English, they are usually translated as “whoever” (in reference to persons) or “whatever” (when referring to things).
Interrogative pronoun¶
An interrogative pronoun is a pronoun that appears at the beginning of a clause/sentence and indicates that the clause/sentence is an interrogative question rather than an indicative statement.