Accusative for the Extent of Time and plural subjects

CEP7 at aol.com CEP7 at aol.com
Thu Dec 23 10:35:57 EST 1999


I've been looking at accusatives for the extent of time with plural subjects 
to see whether or not a group experiences the extent of time as a whole, but 
the individual members of the group experience only a portion of the time. 
For instance, if someone said, "The disciples lived with Jesus for three 
years (hOI MAQHTAI EZHSAN META IHSOU TRIA ETH) would this demand that all the 
disciples lived with Him for the entire three years or could it have a 
distributive sense. Some lived for the entire period, others joined later. Is 
anyone aware of this type of distributive sense used of plural subjects with 
the accusative for extent of time in Greek literature. I have not found any 
in the NT. All the examples in the NT I have found have the entire group 
entering and experiencing the entire period of time together. By the way, the 
question involves the use of the accusative of CILIA ETH in Rev 20:4-6.

Charles Powell
DTS 



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