BDAG at Rv 3:14 - Christ was the first creation now probable

CEP7 at aol.com CEP7 at aol.com
Wed Jan 24 00:46:25 EST 2001



In a message dated 1/23/01 10:22:10 PM, GregStffrd writes:

<< Such a suggestion would seem to give hH ARCH the verbal idea of 
"beginning," depicting Christ as the 'beginner' of God's creation. This would 
seem to assign a creative role to Christ in this verse, which, to me, does 
not seem to fit well with the idea expressed in TOU QEOU. 

It seems as if you are suggesting something like, "[Christ is] the beginner 
of God's creation." But as with the use of AUTOU in Col. 1:15-18, QEOU seems 
to speak of someone other than the one denoted by the head noun, in this case 
ARCH. 

So, I don't find the that idea of Christ as the 'beginner of the creation 
[that] God [created]" works very well. But if you could show an implicit 
verbal idea for ARCH in other uses of the term, I would be open to it. 
 >>

ARCH is cognate to the verb ARCOMAI so it is a verbal noun.     ARCH is 
distinct from QEOU. QEOU is the ultimate agent. ARCH would refer to the 
intermediate agent.

Charles E. Powell, Ph.D.
(h) cep7 at aol.com
(w) cpowell at dts.edu
(h) 972-231-4166
(w) 214-841-3763



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