Future Passives categorized (correction)

Peter Kirk prkirk at pmbx.net
Fri Dec 13 06:36:19 EST 2002


Carl, wouldn't it be more accurate to write that you found 112 forms
with middle sense and 177 with passive sense, including those you chose
not to dispute?

Was it in fact you or Accordance which made this initial distinction
between the two main categories?

I would also suggest some methodological caution here. In several of the
cases where you chose a middle sense, a passive sense is also very
possible, but you have chosen what seems to you to fit the context best.
But it is very dangerous to argue for the meaning of a word from its
context. The most one can safely do is to argue that one possible
meaning is ruled out by the context. In how many of your middle sense
examples can you say that the passive sense is actually impossible,
especially in view of the authors' theological understanding of God as
the sovereign causer of everything? For example, the future passives of
EGEIRW which do not refer to the resurrection of Christ refer to
eschatological events which are clearly seen as under divine control. As
for KOLLAW, the next verse (Mt 19:6) makes it explicit that God is the
agent, so I think this one should be listed as passive - at least as
understood in the context in Matthew.

Now I am not suggesting that such arguments could reduce the number of
definite middle examples to zero. But I think it could reduce them to
rather a small proportion. I suspect we might be nearer the mark to
report 169 definite passives, 56 definite middles and 56 uncertain
cases, or maybe some of the definite passives could be moved to
uncertain as well.

Peter Kirk
peter.r.kirk at ntlworld.com
http://web.onetel.net.uk/~peterkirk/
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Carl W. Conrad [mailto:cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu]
> Sent: 13 December 2002 12:32
> To: Biblical Greek
> Subject: [b-greek] Re: Future Passives categorized (correction)
> 
> In my long listing of MP2 passive forms and analysis of MP2 forms that
I
> argue to be essentially middle, the Totals line at the end should, I
think,
> read:
> 
> Totals: 120 hits, 112 MP2 forms with middle sense, 8 MP2 forms with
> passive
> sense; several arguable one way or the other.
> --
> 
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
> 1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
> cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad at ioa.com
> WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
> 
> ---
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