Lk.6:12 διανυκτερεύειν +activity

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Stephen Hughes
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Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Lk.6:12 διανυκτερεύειν +activity

Post by Stephen Hughes »

Luke 6:12 RP wrote:Ἐγένετο δὲ ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις ταύταις ἐξῆλθεν εἰς τὸ ὄρος προσεύξασθαι· καὶ ἦν διανυκτερεύων ἐν τῇ προσευχῇ τοῦ θεοῦ.
Considering the difference between ἡμερεύειν and διημερεύειν in the following passage from Xenophon, it seems that the δια- prefixed to the front means continuing with what had been going on before / without changing from what was happening before. Perhaps something like, "He went to pray and once he had started praying, he went on (to over-explicate the δια-) praying through the night":
Xenophon, Hellenica 5.4.3 (referenced in [url=http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Ddianuktereu%2Fw]LSJ[/url] copied from [url=http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:abo:tlg,0032,001:5:4:3&lang=original]Perseus[/url]) wrote:[3] ἐκ δὲ τούτου προσλαβὼν ὁ Μέλων ἓξ τοὺς ἐπιτηδειοτάτους τῶν φευγόντων ξιφίδια ἔχοντας καὶ ἄλλο ὅπλον οὐδέν, ἔρχεται πρῶτον μὲν εἰς τὴν χώραν νυκτός: ἔπειτα δὲ ἡμερεύσαντες ἔν τινι τόπῳ ἐρήμῳ πρὸς τὰς πύλας ἦλθον, ὡς δὴ ἐξ ἀγροῦ ἀπιόντες, ἡνίκαπερ οἱ ἀπὸ τῶν ἔργων ὀψιαίτατοι. ἐπεὶ δ᾽ εἰσῆλθον εἰς τὴν πόλιν, διενυκτέρευσαν μὲν ἐκείνην τὴν νύκτα παρὰ Χάρωνί τινι, καὶ τὴν ἐπιοῦσαν δὲ ἡμέραν διημέρευσαν.
[3] After this Melon took with him six of the fittest men among the exiles, armed with daggers and no other weapon, and in the first place proceeded by night into the territory of Thebes; then after spending the day in a deserted spot they came to the city gates, as if on their way back from the country, at just the time when the last returning labourers came in. When they had entered the city, they spent that night at the house of a certain Charon, and likewise spent the following day there.
I say that to state my opinion that the δια- is in Luke 6:12, because of the construction of the passage, not because it is a single word meaning of "throughout the whole night". In other words, I think that if there was another action before it, the verb would have been the un-prefixed νυκτερεύειν, as in something like ἐλθὼν εἰς τὸ ὄρος εἶπε πρὸς τοὺς μαθητὰς αὐτοῦ ὅτι ... , ἔπειτα δὲ ἐνυκτέρευσεν ἐν τῇ προσευχῇ τοῦ θεοῦ. If that is as I think, the constructions for the ἡμερεύειν and νυκτερεύειν can be considered together for this verb διανυκτερεύειν here too.

My question is about ἐν + activity, rather than ἐν + place. Is that definitely a later (i.e. Koine development of these verbs), or does it have historical precedence in the earlier (i.e.Classical) period?
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
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