Hebrews 2:10 DIA

Jonathan Robie jonathan.robie at sagus.com
Thu Jul 29 07:01:46 EDT 1999


This threw me for a loop this morning:

Hebrews 2:10 EPREPEN GAR AUWi, DI' hON TA PANTA KAI DI' hOU TA PANTA, 
POLLOUS hUIOUS EIS DOXAN AGAGONTA TON ARCHGON THS SWTHRIAS AUTWN DIA 
PAQHMATWN TELEIWSAI.

The phrase DI' hON TA PANTA KAI DI' hOU TA PANTA refers to God. The first 
DIA, with the accusative, means "for the sake of"; the second, with the 
genitive, means - at least I thought - "through the agency of". I remember 
first encountering this use of DIA when reading John the first time, where 
I thought the whole point of using DIA in this way was to distinguish the 
primary agent of creation (God) from the secondary agent of creation 
(Jesus).  Some verses where I thought this distinction was carefully made 
using DIA occur in John 1:3, John 1:10, Colossians 1:16.

Hebrews 2:10 threw me for a loop because it uses DIA+genitive for God, who 
would be the primary agent, using the distinction made above.  Other verses 
that seem to use this in a similar way occur in 1 Cor 1:9, 1 Cor 12:8, 
Hebrews 2:10, Hebrews 13:11, 1 Pet 2:14, etc (references thanks to Zerwick, 
section 113).

Also, DIA+genitive is used to refer to the person who betrays Jesus (Matt 
26:24, Mark 14:21, Luke 22:22). I had always thought this implied that 
Judas was an intermediary agent of Satan, the same way that Jesus was an 
intermediate in God's creation.

Incidentally, I tried looking at verses that refer to a man having a child 
by a woman, but the preposition used in these verses seems to be EX rather 
than DIA. Nice try...

At any rate, back to my question: to what extent does DIA+genitive 
distinguish a secondary agent from a primary agent? How is it to be 
understood in the verses discussed above, e.g. in Hebrews 2:10? Is it 
legitimate to translate DI' hON TA PANTA KAI DI' hOU TA PANTA  as "for whom 
and by whom"?

Thanks!

Jonathan



More information about the B-Greek mailing list