1 Clement 2

Bart Ehrman behrman at email.unc.edu
Thu Jun 24 21:59:05 EDT 1999


  In 1 Clement 2:4 we read "Day and night you engaged in a struggle on
behalf of the entire botherhood, EIS TO SWZESQAI MET' ELEOUS KAI
SUNEIDHSEWS TON ARIQMON TWN EKLEKTWN AUTOU.

  Any idea what this (i.e., the "with mercy and conscience") might mean? 
Or better yet (:-)), how it might be translated?

  Two notes: one of the two surviving mss (C, from 1056 CE) gives DEOUS (=
awe or reverence)  for ELEOUS.  And several scholars have suggested
emendations: e.g., Lake gives SUNAISQHSEWS (which, oddly, he translates on
the English side [as "compassion"], even though he retains SUNEIDHSEWS on
the Greek side);  Lightfoot suggests EUDOKHSEWS, and notes that others
have proposed (more violently, he thinks) SUNAINESEWS, SUNEIKSEWS --
sorrry, I don't remember how y'all transliterate the XI -- or SUNDEHSEWS.
Finally, for the third of my two notes: Bauer proposes "conscientiously" 
for META ... SUNEIDHSEWS, on the basis of some late papyri and with
possible support in 1 Clem.  34:7. 

   So my questions: (1) Is there a plausible way to construe the text
without emending it?  and (2) If not, what emendation strikes you (any of
you) as most persuasive?

-- Bart Ehrman
   University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill




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