TOU hHLIOU EKLIPONTOS

Maurice A. O'Sullivan mauros at iol.ie
Tue Jun 19 11:23:23 EDT 2001


At 18:03 18/06/01, Richard Ghilardi wrote:

>KAI HN HDH hWSEI hWRA hEKTH KAI SKOTOS EGENETO EF' hOLHN THN GHN hEWS
>hWRAS ENATHS TOU hHLIOU EKLIPONTOS... LOUK. 23:44f
>
>My question is: What does TOU hHLIOU EKLIPONTOS mean? BDAG says: <<
>Luke's diction is standard for description of an eclipse **be eclipsed**
> >> and lists a number of sources where it has this meaning. Does
>EKLEIPEIN always mean "eclipse" when used in association with hHLIOS?

Richard:
You might like to know that this question is _extensively_ treated in the 
second volume of:
Brown, Raymond E. The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave. 2 
vols. New York: Doubleday, 1994.

As Carl has already pointed out to you << This gets into redaction-critical
questions that are not appropriate for discussion on B-Greek,>>, so I will 
limit myself to pointing out that:

A. your question arose as early as Origen !!,

B that Brown points to two   "strands" of modern translation of  TOU hHLIOU 
EKLIPONTOS, namely:
(a) the sun having been eclipsed
(b) the sun having failed
and notes that " to fail, to give out, to die out " is a normal translation 
of EPIKLEIN, instancing the LXX Sir. 22:9(11) which describes a dead person 
as one who has lost
( EPIKLEIN ) the light, or whose light has failed "
The RSV translates:
    EPI NEKRWi KLAUSON, EXELIPEN GAR FWS

as " weep for the dead, for he lacks the light "

C. " Many modern Lucan scholars, from Lagrange to Marshall and Fitzmyer 
have preferred (b) above.

Regards,
Maurice



Maurice A. O'Sullivan
[Bray, Ireland]

" To bury oneself in a Greek lexicon is to rise with Christ "
--- Sir Edwyn C. Hoskyns, Bart.




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