Different languages look at the perfect verbs in different ways.
Hebrew: C. L. Seow explains the use of the perfect in biblical Hebrew this way: "Biblical Hebrew does not have tenses in the strict sense of the word. Time off occurrence is indicated in context by certain adverbs (time words) and . . . by the way the sentence is constructed. The finite verbs themselves do not indicate tense but aspect—that is, whether the situation is viewed by the speaker/writer as an outsider looking at a situation as a complete whole ("perfect"), or as an insider looking at a situation as it develops ("imperfect"). For example, a narrator recounting a battl may depict the event from the perspective of an outsider who knows the entire situation from beginning to end. If so, the narrator would ideally use verbs in the perfect. A participant in the battle, on the other hand, would probably use verbs in the imperfective, a would a narrator, if that narrator attempts to describe the events as if he or she were personally present when the events unfolded." (A Grammar for Biblical Hebrew, rev. ed. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), 147.) In general then, a perfect verb in Hebrew would be rendered into English by the simple past tense, unless statements of general truths (e.g., "grass withers, flowers fade") or verbs of attitude, perception or experience are involved (e.g., "I love my master," "now I know").
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