forms of hEIS

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Tue Oct 27 16:25:44 EST 1998


At 1:28 PM -0700 10/27/98, Jamie Macleod wrote:
>I am a newbie to biblical greek.   I was wondering why the neutered form of
>'one' (hEN) is used in the first two verses (John 10:30& 17:22), while the
>masculine form, hEIS, is used in the example given from John 6:70.
>
>I was reading a commentary which stated the neutered form is used because it
>is not a complete oneness (ie not a oneness of essence but a oneness of
>persons)  Is this a valid statement, or is the commentator imposing his own
>views on this?  Any insight into the use of  hEIS is welcome.  Thank you.
>
>John 10:30  I and my Father are one.
EGW KAI hO PATHR hEN ESMEN.


>John 17:22  And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they
>may be one, even as we are one:
... hINA WSIN hEN KAQWS hHMEIS hEN.


>John  6:70  Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of
>you is a devil?
EX hUMWN hEIS DIABOLOS ESTIN.

I'd say that in the first two hEN means "one thing"--a unity, and in each 
of these instances hEN is the predicate word: the body of believers is to 
be a unity; Father and Son are a unity; in 6:70 however, hEIS is the 
subject with a partitive genitive, and I'd say it is masculine because the 
believers in this group are all masculine (i.e. hUMWN must be a masculine 
plural), or actually just as likely it is hEIS because the predicate noun 
in this case is the masculine DIABOLOS. I think these are very different 
items: where we have hEN, we're talking about a unity, ONE THING, whereas 
in 6:70 we're talking about an individual, ONE PERSON.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad at yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/



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