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John 1:8
Posted: July 18th, 2011, 11:38 am
by Chris Engelsma
John 1:8
οὐκ ἦν ἐκεῖνος τὸ φῶς...
Is there any grammatical reason why ἐκεῖνος is the subject here and not adjectival with φῶς? I know that in predicate nominative situations like this, the pronoun is usually the subject, but......I can't think of any grammatical reason why it can't be "He was that light..."
thanks
Re: John 1:8
Posted: July 18th, 2011, 12:17 pm
by Randall Tan
ἐκεῖνος (ἐκεῖνος, η, ο) is masculine in grammatical gender and φῶς is neuter. Demonstrative pronouns should match the nouns they modify in case, gender, & number. In a predicate nominative situation, only case and number (with exceptions like collectives) would be required to match.
Re: John 1:8
Posted: July 18th, 2011, 12:45 pm
by cwconrad
To what Randall has said I would add that ἐκεῖνος is not an adjective but a demonstrative pronoun. When used with a noun, the noun most commonly takes an article: e.g. ἐκεῖνος ὁ ἄνθρωπος. But the pronoun can readily function, as it does here, as the subject of a clause.
Re: John 1:8
Posted: July 19th, 2011, 5:19 am
by Sarah Madden
Chris --
Regarding John 1:8
οὐκ ἦν ἐκεῖνος τὸ φῶς...
The pronoun ἐκεῖνος is the subject: "That one was not the light ..." Note that ἐκεῖνος (masculine) is not the same gender as φῶς (neuter), and thus "that light" would not be an acceptable translation. Translating ἐκεῖνος as "He" could also make sense ("He was not the light"), but in the English you would lose the contrast that seems to be intended by the demonstrative pronoun.