[B-Greek] third class conditions
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Tue Nov 25 19:10:13 EST 2003
At 7:51 PM -0300 11/25/03, John Colby wrote:
>Third class conditional sentences have EAN with the subjunctive in the
>protasis. How much should the subjunctive mood be brought out in the
>translation? Is it semantically important or is it merely a marker of a
>third class conditional sentence. For example Matthew 6:22 says: "EAN OUN
>Hi hO OFQALAMOS SOU hALOUS, hOLON TO SWMA SOU FWTEINON ESTAI" Should this
>be rendered, "If therefore your eye is sound, your whole body will be
>bright", or "If therefore your eye might be sound, your whole body will be
>bright"? I know that third class conditional sentences have a wide range
>of meanings, but which of the two elements should be stressed? Or am I
>being dogmatic (again)?
You're really asking a translation question rather than a question about
the structure of the Greek. If you're translating into English, the
subjunctive won't translate at all UNLESS you're trying to put it into
archaic English--that would be, "So if your eye BE sound, ..." But nobody
speaks or writes that anymore; rather we use and indicative, "So if your
eye IS sound, ..."
--
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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