Indirect Object

Jerker Karlsson jerker.karlsson at kdu.se
Thu Oct 31 20:42:38 EST 2002


mitchlarramore at yahoo.com writes:
>The book that I am reading is called Basics of
>Biblical Greek by William D. Mounce.
>
>He says on page 46 about the expression "Karin threw
>to Brad a ball" (In this sentence he says "to Brad" is
>the Indirect Object.)
>
>In English when the word "to" is used, it would go
>after the direct object. "Karin threw the ball to
>Brad." But now "to Brad" is not the indirect object
>but a prepositional phrase.
>
>I do not know why "to Brad" no longer fills the slot
>of Indirect Object. Why?

 What Mounce most likely is trying to say is that in the sentence "Karin
threw Brad a ball" (without the use of to!) you have a verb with two plain
objects/nouns "Brad" and "Ball". These two would in an older grammar of
the english language be called dative and accusative objects respectively. 

In the sentence "Karin threw a ball to brad" you are left with only one
object in the accusative. "Brad" is still there, but he is no longer
directly connected to the verb as an independent object. What has happened
is that the form but not the function of the sentence has changed. Instead
of having two objects with different functions one of the objects has
transformed itself to a prepositional phrase.  This doesn't mean that 
"Brad" no longer fills the slot of the indirect object. On the contrary
the prepositional phrase does exactly that, i.e. filling the empty slot of
indirect object that has been replaced by a prepositional phrase.

Jerker Karlsson
Lund, Sweden

 







 




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