The structures of Gal 2:4 and 2:6

Clwinbery at aol.com Clwinbery at aol.com
Mon Apr 22 13:49:35 EDT 2002


In a message dated 4/22/02 10:39:41 AM Central Daylight Time, 
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu writes:

> >Gal 2:4-5 reads:
>  >
>  >4 DIA DE TOUS PAREISAKTOUS YEUDADELFOUS hOITINES PAREISHLQON
>  >KATASKOPHSAI THN ELEUQERIAN hHMWN [...]
>  >5 hOIS OUDE PROS hWRAN EIXAMEN THi hUTOTAGHi hINA hH ALHQEIA TOU
>  >  EUAGGELIOU DIAMEINHi PROS hUMAS.
>  >
>  >An English translation takes it as follows:
>  >
>  >(It is ) because of the false brothers who ...., to whom we did not...
>  >
>  >But it is not clear what would be referred to by "it". Verse 3 simply
>  >says that Titus was not compelled to get circumcised. What would be
>  >the reference of this implicit pronoun "it"? From the viewpoint of
>  >verse 4, the reference would be the situation where the issue of
>  >circumcision of the Gentile believers occurred. But verse 3 seems to say
>  >that Titus was not compelled by the three apostles,  whom Paul met
>  >privately, to be circumcised. Therefore, it is difficult to infer
>  >the situation which can be the referent of the implicit "it".
>  >
>  >So, a wild guess occurred to me about the structure of the sentence.
>  >I would like get some comments. Here is a translation from this wild
>  >guess:
>  >
>  >Concerning the false brothers who came in to...., to them we did not
>  >submit even for a moment .....
>  >
>  >This translation contains two crucial decisions.
>  >DIA DE TOUS PAREISAKTOUS YEUDADELFPOUS is taken to introduce
>  >the topic. hOIS in verse 5 is taken to be a demonstrative pronoun.
>  >
>  >Another reason for the above translation is the parallelism/contrast
>  >between the beginning of 2.4-5 and and the beginning of 2.6.
>  >DIA DE TOUS PAREISAKTOUS YEUDADELFPOUS is parallel to APO DE TWN
>  >DOKOUNTWN EINAI TI in verse 2.6. The contrast between the two groups
>  >is indicated by ALLA TOUNANTION (but on the contrary) in verse 2.7.
>  >It is quite reasonable to translate APO DE TWN DKOUNTWN EINAI TI as
>  >"concerning those important people who are somebody", again introducing
>  >the topic of the sentence in 2.6- 9, whose main clause is found in verse
>  >9.
>  >
>  >
>  >Any comments?
>  
>  Yes; I dealt first with your later question about Gal 2:2 and there noted
>  my view that the writing here is very loose, even conversational, rather
>  than composed with careful rhetoric (in fact, at least the whole first two
>  chapters here strike me as having been written very quickly and in a
>  turbulent state of mind). For that reason, I think that the sequence in
>  these verses is better explained in terms of a grammatical anacoluthon,
>  i.e. that Paul started writing and switched horses/grammatical
>  structures--in mid-stream/mid-sentence. I think that it's best to carry
>  over the construction exactly or nearly exactly as it stands in the
>  original Greek: "But because of the false brothers who were sneaked in to
>  snoop and do espionage on our liberty (I didn't yield to submit for a
>  moment to them in my concern to preserve for you intact the truth of the
>  gospel!)--but on the part of those reputed to be of some importance (it
>  doesn't matter to me what they were--God doesn't pay attention to what's on
>  the surface--the reputed people didn't lay any additional obligation upon
>  me." This is all very choppy; Paul voices a phrase and then comments on it
>  parenthetically before proceeding to his next point, and in the course of
>  this, his grammatical chain has been badly interrupted. This is the way we
>  talk, and our letters sometimes take this kind of "tack" or oblique sort of
>  movement from point to point. That's what I think is happening here.
>  -- 
A number of commentators argue that the DIA DE . . .at the beginning of verse 
4 indicates that, in fact, Titus did wind up circumcised. Was it E.D. Burton 
who said, "Who can doubt that it was the knife that circumcised Titus that 
butchered the syntax of this account." Me thinks Paul was a bit upset.

Carlton Winbery
Louisiana College



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