[B-Greek] 1 Corinthians 11:1-16 KATA & KATAKALPTW
Steven Lo Vullo
slovullo at mac.com
Sat Apr 26 02:21:34 EDT 2003
On Friday, April 25, 2003, at 03:20 PM, perry & Debbie McChesney wrote:
> Having said that, why in verses 6
> & 7 does Paul use different forms of KATAKALUPTW instead of the word
> for
> veil used 4 times by him in 2 Corinthians 3:13-16 (in reference to the
> veil wore by Moses over his face) KALUMA.
In 2 Cor 3 Paul is referring to the covering of Moses' face to conceal
the afterglow of his meetings with God. He is drawing on the story of
Ex 34, which in the LXX uses the specific word KALUMMA to designate the
article Moses would use to hide his face from the Israelites. At any
rate, why would it be necessary to use the same words in every case to
communicate the same or a similar thing, idea, or activity?
> In the gospel headings the
> word KATA seems to be used in a paculiar sense meaning something handed
> down. Why is the KATA neccessary here? Is Paul playing pass the
> covering? Why KALUPTW and not KALUMA?
The same preposition may have a quite different meaning depending on
context and the case of the word it governs. As for the Gospel
headings, KATA governs personal names in the accusative case. When
governing a word in the accusative case, KATA often means "according
to." So KATA MAQQAION means "according to Matthew," i.e., Matthew's
version of the Gospel. The Gospels, of course, **were** handed down,
but this is **not** what is communicated by KATA in these instances.
On the other hand, when KATA governs a word in the genitive case, such
as KEFALHS in 1 Cor 11.4, it is often a "marker of extension or
orientation in space or specific area" (BDAG 1.). In 1 Cor 11.4 it has
the sense "of location that is relatively lower, down from someth."
(BDAG 1.a.). A veil is naturally thought of as flowing down from the
top of the head, so the idiom KATA KEFALHS ECWN isn't particularly
surprising or puzzling.
I'm not really sure what you mean by the question, "Is Paul playing
pass the covering?" Are you suggesting that Paul wanted the Corinthian
women to "hand down" their veils from one to another? If so, that is
certainly not in view here.
============
Steven R. Lo Vullo
Madison, WI
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