[B-Greek] John 1:12-13 - translating the participle

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Aug 14 13:33:56 EDT 2003


At 10:49 AM -0500 8/14/03, Eric Weiss wrote:
>John 1:12-13 is usually translated (NASB used here):
>
>"But as many as received (ELABON - aorist finite) Him, to them he gave
>(EDWKEN - aorist finite) the right to become (GENESQAI - aorist
>infinitive) children of God, even to those who believe (PISTEUOUSIN -
>present participle) in His name, who were born (EGENNHQHSAN - aorist
>finite) not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of
>man, but of God."
>
>As I understand things, the present participle does not have a time sense,
>but rather has a continuous aspect. Since all the other verbs in these
>verses are aorist and likely have a past time sense from the author's
>perspective, should PISTEUOUSIN be translated in some manner as a past
>tense (I don't know how you'd best be able to do this in English and
>retain the continuous aspect of the participle)? Or are these finite
>aorist verbs gnomic(?) aorists, and hence what John wrote isn't restricted
>to being about what happened in the past to those in Jesus' lifetime who
>believed in Him, but is true for anyone at anytime who believes in Him --
>and hence the "present tense" translation of the participle is warranted?
>Or are there other options/explanations?

Seems to me that the temporal relationships between the clauses are pretty
much as they are in Jn 3:16 ... TON hUION TON MONOGENH EDWKEN, hINA PAS hO
PISTEUWN EIS AUTON MH APOLHTAI ALL' ECHi ZWHN AIWNION.

That is to say, although they may bear slightly different senses, I should
think that EXOUSIAN TEKNA QEOU GENESQAI is implicitly comparable to ZWHN
AIWNION ECEIN, and that the PAS hO PISTEUWN EIS AUTON of 3:16 is equivalent
to the TOIS PISTEUOUSIN EIS TO ONOMA AUTOU. To put it rather colloquially,
it seems to me that the gift was given in the past, but the gift keeps on
giving to those who keep on believing--then, now, and hereafter, inasmuch
as the inception of belief is not restricted to the time of the original
giving.
-- 

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/



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