[B-Greek] hUMWN in 1 Cor 9.11

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Sat May 17 19:28:41 EDT 2003


At 3:45 PM -0500 5/17/03, Steven Lo Vullo wrote:
>Hi all:
>
>1 Cor 9.11: EI hHMEIS hUMIN TA PNEUMATIKA ESPEIRAMEN, MEGA EI hHMEIS
>hUMWN TA SARKIKA QERISOMEN?
>
>Some translations take hUMWN as possessive (see KJV, NKJV, ASV, RSV,
>NRSV), which is, of course, grammatically valid. But others seem to
>take it in an ablative sense (see ESV, NASB, NAS95, NIV, NET, TEV, CEV,
>REB, NAB, NJB). With respect to the ablative option,  the verb QERIZW
>does seem suited to the idea of separation, and if balanced with hUMIN
>the corresponding hUMWN would seem to indicate source or separation
>("sowed **to** you ... shall reap **from you**). But on the other hand,
>I wonder if we should expect a preposition with hUMWN if indeed the
>ablative idea is intended (see, e.g., EK THS SARKOS QERISEI ... EK TOU
>PNEUMATOS QERISEI in Gal 6.8. Any comments or ideas?

I'm just wondering whether the translators actually understand the genitive
pronoun as genuinely ablatival and are not simply rendering what they take
to be the implicit sense; I don't see any clear instance of QERIZW being
used with an ablatival genitive in earlier Greek; I think there really
OUGHT to be a preposition with such a genitive. I'd be more ready to accept
it if the verb had at least a prefix indicating separation or source. On
the other hand, that hHMEIS hUMIN/hHMEIS hUMWN antithesis just may perhaps
succeed by rhetorical cleverness. But I confess I'm thinking out loud
(on-line?)
-- 

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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