Romans 5:12 dia touto

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ronsnider1
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Romans 5:12 dia touto

Post by ronsnider1 »

Διὰ τοῦτο ὥσπερ δι' ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου ἡ ἁμαρτία εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν καὶ διὰ τῆς ἁμαρτίας ὁ θάνατος, καὶ οὕτως εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁ θάνατος διῆλθεν, ἐφ' ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον

A couple of questions, the first is to what (if anything) does the first DIA TOUTO refer? Suggestions are all over the place. Secondly, although Paul never seems to use KAI HOUTWS to complete the comparison introduced by HWSPER (he uses HOUTWS KAI in most places, if not all), does this complete the comparison begun by HWSPER. Again some suggest it does, while others indicate (as do many translations) that the full comparison is not made until verse 18. However, that is somewhat problematic since verse 18 deals with specific actions, while verse 12 is pretty clearly using the articular form of HAMARTIA to reference the sin nature, which obviously came into existence through the original sin of Adam.

Any insights?
Ron Snider
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Stephen Hughes
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Re: Romans 5:12 dia touto

Post by Stephen Hughes »

ronsnider1 wrote:A couple of questions, the first is to what (if anything) does the first DIA TOUTO (Διὰ τοῦτο) refer? Suggestions are all over the place. ... Any insights?
Usually when suggestions are all over the place, there are many possibilities. διὰ (+ αἰτ.) is a very broad preposition. No insights, but if you listen to this read this at normal speed without going back to recap, how much can you remember? For me it is a couple of pooints for a couple of seconds. In a well written work, understanding is within the realm of comfortable human processing. If there is a suggestion among those that you have that refers back to something that would have been read more than 10 seconds ago, or that was made before other points were raised before this and that, then it would have been difficult for a person listening to the letter being read to follow it. We are very familiar with these passages, seeing as we have been hearing them in different contexts throughout our lives. Perhaps one way of imagining it would be to think of the last State of the Nation (State of the Union) address or last year's Queen's Christmas Message. The people listening are already quite familiar with the topics and themes that are being spoken about, so there is not much explanation of what has happened, but there is a degree to which things are brought together and some more meaning is given to the the events. A looking back and a looking forward. Διὰ τοῦτο, of course brings what has just been said to bear on what follows.

My listening comprehension is quite good in Modern Greek in some topics, and generally I can follow the New Testament by listening better than by reading, and when I listen to this chapter and the one before read at a normal speed, two things stand out for me, one is the general theme of the section, that Abraham was accredited with righteous apart from works, and the specific last point that we got back together with God, through his son. When I heard the Διὰ τοῦτο I listened for which of the two it would have been referring to. After listening to the next section - the one that you have brought up for discussion, my impression was that neither of the two really lead up to the point being made. The way to resolve that is to take διά in the broadest possible sense and τοῦτο in the vaguest possible sense, some thing consequential, but not specific. "Therefore", "It follows then...", "Considering that further...". You could compare that with various translations, f you would like to.
ronsnider1 wrote:Secondly, although Paul never seems to use KAI HOUTWS (καὶ οὕτως) to complete the comparison introduced by HWSPER (ὥσπερ) (he uses HOUTWS KAI (οὕτως καὶ) in most places, if not all), does this complete the comparison begun by HWSPER (ὥσπερ). Again some suggest it does, while others indicate (as do many translations) that the full comparison is not made until verse 18.
I think it depends whether the second καί is read heavy or light.
Διὰ τοῦτο, ὥσπερ δι’ ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου ἡ ἁμαρτία εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν, καὶ διὰ τῆς ἁμαρτίας ὁ θάνατος, καὶ οὕτως εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁ θάνατος διῆλθεν, ἐφ’ ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον
Seeing as the verb is not repeated the first καί would be read light. If the second καί is read light, then it would relate to what comes before it, like another phrase in the sentence, so the first καί would be a comma in English. The sentence sort of builds up, where the three phrases; A, B and C, are such that C is a rephrased A+B. If the second καί is read heavy (as a dis-joined conjunction, so to speak, making the following phrase like an adverb), that would leave it sort of disjointed.

In the other cases you mentioned (Romans 5:19, 6:4, 1 Corinthians 11:12, 15:22, 16:1, 2 Corinthians 1:7 (Byz.), Galatians 4:29, Ephesians 5:24 (Byz.), James 2:26, ) the emphasis is added as you say by the καί following, but in Romans 6:19, emphasis is added by a νῦν.

There are some examples of this syntax with an emphasised first part, and an unemphasised second half of this syntactical construction to be found in
Matthew 14:12 wrote:Ὥσπερ γὰρ ἦν Ἰωνᾶς ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τοῦ κήτους τρεῖς ἡμέρας καὶ τρεῖς νύκτας, οὕτως ἔσται ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ τῆς γῆς τρεῖς ἡμέρας καὶ τρεῖς νύκτας.
And so also in Matthew 13:40, 24:27, 24:37, Luke 17:24, John 5:21, 5:26.

The form ὥσπερ is in fact a strengthened form of ὡς, and that unemphatic entire syntactical construction (properly without a καί to emphasis the second part) is like this
Acts 8:32 wrote:Ὡς πρόβατον ἐπὶ σφαγὴν ἤχθη, καὶ ὡς ἀμνὸς ἐναντίον τοῦ κείροντος αὐτὸν ἄφωνος, οὕτως οὐκ ἀνοίγει τὸ στόμα αὐτοῦ.
So also Mark 9:3 (SBL-NAUBS), John 7:46 (backwards), Acts 23:18, Romans 5:15, Romans 5:18, 1 Corinthians 5:3, 1 Corinthians 7:7, 1 Corinthians 7:17, 9:26 (backwards), 2 Corinthians 7:14, 2 Corinthians 11:3, 1 Thessalonians 2:4 (backwards), 5:2, James 2:12 (backwards). Contrary to that pattern, however, both 2 Corinthians 1:7 (SBL-NAUBS) and Ephesians 5:24 have the unemphatic ὡς followed by an οὕτως emphasised with a καί, those two examples have been cleaned up in the Byzantine text.

It is often good to consider your question in a broader context.
ronsnider1 wrote:However, that is somewhat problematic since verse 18 deals with specific actions, while verse 12 is pretty clearly using the articular form of HAMARTIA (ἁμαρτία) to reference the sin nature, which obviously came into existence through the original sin of Adam.
There are assumptions and presuppositions here that not all scholars would agree existed in the thinking of the writer since he was living in before the age when the Church had major dealings with the Gnostics. It could be that Paul was arguing that matter or the world was not inherently evil, as it might be taken to be in a Gnostic understanding of Anti-cosmic dualism. The implications for that in terms of understanding, really only affect the phrase εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν. If the debate is directed against Gnostic ideas, then κόσμος being spoken of would more probably be the world (created world), but if not, then I think ἡ ἁμαρτία εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν is referring to all people, and is a parallel phrase to εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁ θάνατος διῆλθεν. Social and religious context is of course very useful to help us understand which of the possible renderings of the Greek is more suitable, and also which renderings were likely to have been made at different times in the history of the Church by different groups holding various ideas external to the text. In this case, I think the Greek could cater for either.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Stephen Hughes
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Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Re: Romans 5:12 dia touto

Post by Stephen Hughes »

Stephen Hughes wrote:I think it depends whether the second is read heavy or light.

Διὰ τοῦτο, ὥσπερ δι’ ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου ἡ ἁμαρτία εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν, καὶ διὰ τῆς ἁμαρτίας ὁ θάνατος, καὶ οὕτως εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁ θάνατος διῆλθεν, ἐφ’ ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον
That was incorrectly underlined, I meant to underline the second καί; the one I was talking about.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
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