hALAS (was EIDENAI PWS)

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Wed May 24 10:48:02 EDT 2000


Although this was sent to me privately, I think it may have been meant for
the list and I have a response that I'd like further feedback from
others--regarding the meaning of hALAS.

At 1:52 PM +0000 5/24/00, Emory Pitts (i.e. Mark Wilson) wrote:
>Carl:
>
>I apologize for not including the whole text. That certainly makes sense to
>me.
>
>If I may follow-up with two brief questions:
>
>Col. 4:5 EN SOFIAi PERIPATEITE PROS TOUS EXW TON KAIRON EXAGORAZOMENOI. 6
>hO LOGOS hUMWN PANTOTE EN CARITI, hALATI HRTUMENOS, EIDENAI PWS DEI hUMAS
>hENI hEKASTWi APOKRINESQAI.
>
>1. Your translation 'sense of humor' is most interesting. The traditional
>translation of course is 'seasoned with salt.' Could you elaborate on your
>choice of words? ("When you speak to each other, do so with good will and
>with a sense of humor.")

This is a good question; to tell the truth, I understood that sense from
the standard extended sense of SAL/SALES in Latin. Upon checking the Greek
dictionaries I have readily available in AcCordance, I'm frankly somewhat
surprised to find absolutely nothing else offered for the Greek word hALAS
but "salt." Yet it is clear that in the four NT passages in which the word
is found, the word must be metaphorical. Three of the passages are the
Jesus saying, hUMEIS ESTE TO hALAS THS GHS KTL (Mk 9:50; Mt 5:13; Lk
14:34). The fourth is our passage. Now in Mt and Lk the follow-up
rhetorical question of Jesus is phrased, EAN DE TO hALAS MWRANQHi, EN TINI
hALISQHSETAI. I think the verb MWRANQHi (from MWRAINW) is significant here:
it means "make foolish" or "stultify"; I may be wrong, but it seems to me
that the sense "go flat" (of taste) is here an indication that hALAS is
understood by Mt and Lk to mean something like "acuity" in a broader sense
than pungency of taste, and in fact rather to some sort of
'distinction'--or 'personableness' or 'personality' or the like.

Louw & Nida offer the following, and while it may be true for most
translators in most languages that "there is no difficulty involved in
finding an adequate expression for it," yet I find the sense less than
obvious, even with 'becomes tasteless" for MWRANQHi:

"5.25 hAS, hALOS m; hALAS, ATOS n (there is no distinction of meaning
between these two terms; hALAS is merely a later spelling) - 'salt.'  'you
are the salt of the earth, but if the salt becomes tasteless, how will it
be made salty again?' Mt 5:13.
	"Since salt is a universal condiment, there is no difficulty
involved in finding an adequate expression for it, but there is a
difficulty in Mt 5:13, since pure salt cannot lose its taste. In the
ancient world, however, what was often sold as salt was highly adulterated
and the sodium chloride could leach out in humid weather, in which case the
residue (normally a form of lime) would be useless. It may, therefore, be
important in some languages to provide a marginal note explaining the basis
for the biblical statement concerning salt losing its flavor; otherwise,
the parable may appear to be either meaningless or misleading."

LSJ at the Perseus web site offers the following (I cite only the section I
consider relevant--and note the citation of Col 4:6 here!):

"IV. hales, hoi, metaph., like Lat. sales, wit, possible but unlikely in
Plat. Sym. 177b, Ep.Col.4.6; certain in Plu.2.854c; hales called "charites"
IBID=au=Plu. 685a. (Cf.sq.)"

And finally, also from the Perseus web site, the definition from the Lewis
& Short unabridged Latin Dictionary s.v. SAL:

"II. Trop.
A. Intellectual acuteness, good sense, shrewdness, cunning, wit,
facetiousness, sarcasm, a witticism, witty saying (class. in sing. and
plur.; "syn.: lepos, facetiae, festivitas): (sal) adeo necessarium
elementum est, ut transierit intellectus ad voluptates animi quoque. Nam
ita sales appellantur, omnisque vitae lepos et summa hilaritas laborumque
requies non alio magis vocabulo constat", Plin. 31, 7, 41, § 88.
"a. Sing.: "qui habet salem, quod in te est", Ter. Eun. 3, 1, 10; cf.:
"nulla venustas, Nulla in tam magno est corpore mica salis", Cat. 86.4:
"Caesar inusitatum nostris oratoribus leporem quendam et salem est
consecutus", Cic. de Or. 2, 23, 98; cf. id. N. D. 2, 29, 74: "sale vero et
facetiis Caesar vicit omnis", id. Off. 1, 37, 133: "(litterae) tum
humanitatis sparsae sale", id. Att. 1, 13, 1: "qui (versus) dum denique
habent salem ac leporem", Cat. 16.7: "P. Scipio omnes sale facetiisque
superabat", Cic. Brut. 34, 128; cf.: "argutiae facetissimi salis", Plin.
35, 10, 37, § 117: "salis satis est, sannionum parum, Cic Fam. 9, 16, 10:
in quo mihi videtur specimen fuisse humanitatis, salis, suavitatis,
leporis", id. Tusc. 5, 19, 55: "(Lucilius) sale multo Urbem defricuit",
Hor. S. 1, 10, 3; cf. "of the same: acerbitas et abundantia salis", Quint.
10, 1, 94: hic delectatur iambis, Ille Bioneïs sermonibus et sale nigro, i.
e. biting wit, sarcasm, Hor. Ep. 2, 2, 60; Cat. 13.5: "qui plurimum in
scribendo et salis haberet et fellis nec candoris minus", Plin. Ep. 3, 21,
1. --
"(b). Neutr. (ante-class.): "quicquid loquitur, sal merum est", Afran. ap.
Prisc. p. 659 P.; so, (puella) Charitôn mia, tota merum sal, Lucr. 4,
1162.--
"b. Plur.: "Romani veteres atque urbani sales", Cic. Fam. 9, 15, 2: "vestri
proavi Plautinos Laudavere sales", Hor. A. P. 271; Sen. Vit. Beat. 27, 2:
"periculosi sales", id. Tranq. 1, 4: "libaboque tuos, scite Menandre,
sales", Prop. 3 (4), 21, 28: "huic generi orationis aspergentur etiam
sales, qui in dicendo minimum quantum valent: quorum duo genera sunt, unum
facetiarum, alterum dicacitatis", Cic. Or. 26, 87; cf. Quint. 6, 3, 15; 10,
1, 117: "(Ciceronem) in salibus aliquando frigidum", id. 12, 10, 12: "a
salibus suffusis felle refugi", Ov. Tr. 2, 565: "protervi sales", Stat. S.
1, 6, 6: "salibus vehemens intra pomoeria natis", Juv. 9, 11.--*
"B. (Borrowed from the use of salt as a relish.) Good taste, elegance:
"tectum antiquitus constitutum plus salis quam sumptûs habebat", Nep. Att.
13, 2.--
"C. Sharpness, pungency, stimulus, incentive: "quae (sc. calor, sanguis)
aviditatem naturali sale augent", Plin. 10, 72, 93, § 198."

I'd not be surprised if this usage of hALAS in Koine Greek derives from the
Latin usage, but obviously I can't prove it.

Finally, hALAS cannot possibly mean literally "salt" in the passage in
Colossians--it must be metaphorical. But what is speech "seasoned with
salt"? Not, I think, "saucy" or "sassy", and not "off-color" or "piquant"
in any lewdly suggestive sense, but rather "good nature" or "good humor" as
LSJ seem to say and as more common Latin usage of SAL/SALES indicates.

>2. On a purely syntactical level, would you consider it extremely awkward
>for EIDENAI to modify SOFIAi? Either translation I find acceptable, but I am
>trying to train myself to initially list all possible options (without
>forcing it). I am going through a sentence diagram workbook on Colossians by
>Grassmick. He does not present alternatives.

Frankly I do consider it extremely awkward and I don't see alternatives
either: it is simply too far removed from SOFIA, in my opinion, and
moreover, there's no semantic indicator that would point back to that word
in the preceding precept (which is about speech to outsiders, while verse 6
seems to me to be talking about speech even to members of the
congregation). If it were not possible to find EIDENAI meaningful as
expressing purpose/result or as a substitute for an imperative, than I
might be willing to consider a link back to SOFIA, but to me it just seems
very unlikely.

-- 

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad at ioa.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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