1 Cor 6:5, outsiders?

Steven Craig Miller scmiller at www.plantnet.com
Fri Oct 8 20:17:28 EDT 1999


To: Carlton Winbery,

<< Yes, it is a good translation to translate "despised by the church."
The translation of the dative with EN is a matter of context. The presense
of a passive verbal idea lends itself to see the dative (instrumental) as
agency. Agency is rare in the dative case. >>

FWIW ... although occasionally a prepositional phrase with EN is taken to
express personal agency, it is very rare. Daniel B. Wallace, in his "Greek
Grammar Beyond the Basics" (1996), states that the best example for EN +
dative for personal agency is 1 Cor 6:2 "the world is to be judged BY YOU."
But Wallace states that such an interpretation is "by no means certain,"
and he cites Robertson-Plummer who suggest that EN hUMIN means "in your
court" or "in your jurisdiction." Thus there are no unambiguous examples
which would indicate that EN with personal agency is a viable phenomenon in
the Greek NT. Nonetheless, A.T. Robertson suggests Col 1:17 (534).

-Steven Craig Miller (scmiller at www.plantnet.com)





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