42 Adina Moshavi in the context of their conversation with the official, his questions regarding the family seemed to be an innocent inquiry. Another example is Moses’ argument against his appointment as emissary to Pharaoh (Exod 6,12): “The Israelites would not listen to me; how should Pharaoh listen to me, when I have impeded speech?” Since the implied premise “Pharaoh will not listen to me” is debatable, Moses backs up the premise by a rmwjw lq (a fortiori) argument, “The Israelites would not listen to me”, in addition to citing his speech impediment (48). 5. Denying the antecedent Reconstruction as modus tollens is problematic for many arguments superficially resembling the ones discussed in the previous section. In Jud 14,3, for example, Samson’s parents reply to his demand that they take him a Philistine wife: “Is there no woman among the daughters of your own kinsmen and among all our people, that you go to take a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines?” If we reconstruct the first premise according to the modus tollens form, the complete argument is as follows: Premise 1: If you are justified in going to take a Philistine wife, then there are no wives to be found among your own people. Premise 2: There are wives to be found among your own people. Conclusion: You should not go to take a Philistine wife. This argument, however, would make no sense to Samson, who clearly does not accept the first premise, i.e., that he is justified in seeking a Philistine wife only in the event that there are no Israelite women to marry. It would be pointless for the speaker to present an argument that he knows the addressee will reject out of hand. Van Selms’ reductio ad absurdum interpretation of such arguments (see above) is apparently built on the assumption that the arguments most closely resemble modus tollens. Following van Selms’ approach, the argument would be reconstructed as follows: “From the fact that you are going to take a Philistine wife, one could almost conclude that there are no eligible Israelite women. Since this is obviously not true, your conduct is not justified.” According to van Selms, the speaker is not claiming that the conclusion actually follows from the premise, but that one “could almost” conclude it, or that one “could” conclude it. But how would such an argument be persuasive to an addressee who certainly would not conclude anything of the kind? I propose that arguments of this type should be understood as denying the antecedent, not modus tollens. Denying the antecedent is one of the traditional formal fallacies, taking the following form: Premise 1: If B then A. Premise 2: Not B. Conclusion: Not A. (48) See also the similar Exod 6,30. Additional modus tollens arguments that are accompanied by supplementary evidence include Num 22,38 and 1 Sam 25,10.