What is the funda of 'Have had'. experts help...

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In June, 1981, six teenagers in the village of Medjurje, Yugoslavia, claimed to have had visions of the Virgin Mary, who they say has continued to appear to them over the ensuing years.

[A] claimed to have had visions of the Virgin Mary, who

claimed to have visions of the Virgin Mary, whom

[C] claimed to have had visions of the Virgin Mary, whom

[D] claimed to have visions of the Virgin Mary, who

[E] had claimed to have had visions of the Virgin Mary, whom


The given OA is A.


Could any of the experts please help me understand that what does 'have had' mean, does it mean a past perfect or a present perfect.

And what is the concept behind the same.

very much needed.


I think 'have had' is a tense that is used to made parallel to the said tense in the other non underlined part in the sentence.

eg: in the same time or in the same era or in the same age etc etc. that is why it will make the things parallel.

Where a past perfect tense or present perfect tense is absolutely not required.
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Source: — Sentence Correction |

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by EducationAisle » Sat Dec 08, 2012 6:33 pm
Actually this is another variation (in lack of a better word). to have had is not really present perfect in a strict sense; it is called perfect infinitive ("infinitive" in English is "to" + the basic form of verb).

You could write the sentence in either of the following ways:

a) Past Perfect:
Six teenagers in the village of Medjurje, Yugoslavia claimed that they had had visions of the Virgin Mary.

b) Perfect Infinitive:
Six teenagers in the village of Medjurje, Yugoslavia claimed to have had visions of the Virgin Mary.

There is no to had had construct in English. So, guess you just have to make yourself comfortable with this.
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by hutch27 » Sat Dec 08, 2012 9:13 pm
Hi amit,

I am new to sentence correction, so i'm no expert, but I think I understand what is being tested here so I will try and explain what I think is right.

You can eliminate B,C, and E because they all use whom and this is used incorrectly. Now we are left with A, and D, and clearly the only difference between the two is the use of "have", and "have had".

In order to understand this concept being tested we must first understand the difference between the simple past tense and the present tenses.

The Present perfect tense "have had" is constructed by forming has/have + past participle. This is used to indicate something that occurred at an indefinite time in the past and may continue into the present or the future. Because this sentence tells is that these visions continue to appear into the future, the present perfect tense have had, is grammatically correct.

As such, A is the right answer.

I must add though that i'm not an expert and this was merely an interpretation of what this question was asking.

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