Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

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Thomas Dolhanty
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Thomas Dolhanty »

RandallButh wrote:Thomas, Clay Stirling has provided the basic answer. Another part of the answer is to phrase the question properly.
“Fool! Tonight they will require your soul of you.”
The English translation has subtly changed the communication by doing something that is sometimes heard when people learn to speak Hebrew. The word "they" cannot be added in Hebrew. For example, Hebrew has an idiom qorim li ____ (qorim li Yochanan, my name is Yochanan, they are calling me Yochanan). In English a person needs to add a "they" in order to mimic the structure because one cannot say just "calling me Y., or "calls me Y." However, one cannot add "they" in Hebrew. If someone says "hem qorim li Y." the listener immediately asks "who are 'they'?" By adding 'they' the subject becomes 'real' and 'referential'. But in Hebrew, even though participles require subjects, this idiom requires the subject not to be mentioned. The subject is indefinite and must remain so for the idiom. That is why it is called a substitute for the passive. In a passive the subject is not given. He is called Y. The listeners do not stop and ask "who called?" (Reminds me of Maynard G Krebs in Dobie Gillis: [as Maynard walks by] D: Hey Maynard. M: You rang?) [For second-llanguage English users: the joke/word play revolves around an implied 'call' as a vocative and 'call by telephone'.].
Back to the quoted translation, "they" cannot be added without skewing the focus and reference.
Which is why all of the English versions translate it "this night your soul is required of you" or some such using the divine passive, because the divine passive is common in English as in Greek. If the versions wrote "this night they are requiring your soul of you" everyone would ask "Who is they"? What about the Greek, though. would Greek readers not ask the same question about the "they" of ἀπαιτοῦσιν, or would they be familiar with the idiom in Greek? Or, perhaps, would Luke's original audience make the association with a source because of the unusual construction?
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Andrew Chapman
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Andrew Chapman »

Thomas Dolhanty wrote:Which is why all of the English versions translate it "this night your soul is required of you" or some such
Tyndale: But God sayde vnto him: Thou fole this night will they fetche awaye thy soule agayne from the. Then whose shall thoose thinges be which thou hast provyded?

Andrew
RandallButh
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by RandallButh »

Fascinating. It feels like a VSO language.
I have not studied about whenever English became SVO.
Stephen Carlson
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Stephen Carlson »

RandallButh wrote:Fascinating. It feels like a VSO language.
I have not studied about whenever English became SVO.
English used to be a V2 language like German, Swedish, and other Germanic languages.
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Thomas Dolhanty
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Thomas Dolhanty »

Andrew Chapman wrote:
Thomas Dolhanty wrote:Which is why all of the English versions translate it "this night your soul is required of you" or some such
Tyndale: But God sayde vnto him: Thou fole this night will they fetche awaye thy soule agayne from the. Then whose shall thoose thinges be which thou hast provyded?

Andrew
Very nice, thanks Andrew! Vintage Tyndale - not only faithful to his text but with music in the translation!

[quote="William Tyndale""]16 And he put forth a similitude vnto them sayinge: The groude of a certayne riche ma brought forth frutes plenteously 17 and he thought in himsilfe sayinge: what shall I do? because I have noo roume where to bestowe my frutes? 18 And he sayde: This will I do. I will destroye my barnes and bilde greater and therin will I gadder all my frutes and my goodes: 19 and I will saye to my soule: Soule thou hast moch goodes layde vp in stoore for many yeares take thyne ease: eate drinke and be mery. 20 But God sayde vnto him: Thou fole this night will they fetche awaye thy soule agayne from the. Then whose shall thoose thinges be which thou hast provyded?[/quote]
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RandallButh
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by RandallButh »

Stephen Carlson wrote:
RandallButh wrote:Fascinating. It feels like a VSO language.
I have not studied about whenever English became SVO.
English used to be a V2 language like German, Swedish, and other Germanic languages.
Do you know when? I was surprised by the relatively late date.
Stephen Carlson
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Stephen Carlson »

RandallButh wrote:
Stephen Carlson wrote:
RandallButh wrote:Fascinating. It feels like a VSO language.
I have not studied about whenever English became SVO.
English used to be a V2 language like German, Swedish, and other Germanic languages.
Do you know when? I was surprised by the relatively late date.
Old English was already a weaker V2 language than other Germanic languages and the V2 syntax declined construction-by-construction over the course of Middle English until it mostly disappeared. Mostly but not entirely: the main remaining exceptions are with initial negatives ("never again will he drink vodka") and some locatives ("here comes the bride").
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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RandallButh
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by RandallButh »

Thank you. The middle English makes sense, which is why Tyndall was surprising. Apparently a remnant with a time margin.

We now have a guy in Hebrew studies who doesn't understand V2 as an instantiation of VSO and invokes ad hoc rules to create ki 'asa ha-melex et ha-davar from *ki ha-melex 'asa., arguing that Hebrew is SVO...
Ματταθίας
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by Ματταθίας »

I have read that Luke is one of the better writers of Greek in the New Testament, so wouldn't he have used a passive ending of ἀπαιτέω if it was mean to be in the passive?
Matt Green
RandallButh
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Re: Luke 12:20: 3rd pl. pres. ind. act. of ἀπαιτέω

Post by RandallButh »

The appreciation of Luke's Greek style is often based on the introduction to the Gospel in Luke 1:1-4, the intro to Acts 1:1-4, and Acts 15:36 to end. Throughout the Gospel Luke's sources had a profound effect on his style and lots of individual measurements show differences between the Gospel, Acts 1-15 and Acts 16-28.

So one cannot assume that Luke would or would not have crossed a threshhold to write his best Greek at any one point. Luke let "Hebraisms" through and into his Gospel, both those that happen to be illustrated in the LXX and those independent of the LXX (non-LXX Hebraisms--he did not model his style on the LXX but had access to Hebraized sources). In other words I would not call Luke's style among the better Greek NT writers, but 'schizophrenic.'
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