[B-Greek] m/p participles in Colossians

Iver Larsen iver_larsen at sil.org
Fri Oct 24 02:03:35 EDT 2003


Just to add a couple of thoughts and suggestions to Carl's good answer to an
interesting question:

> AUXANW, etc. in the active normally means "cause to grow/increase" whereas
> AUXANOMAI, etc. in the middle-passive normally means "experience growth."
> Thus a farmer might say that the rain and the sunshine cause the grain to
> grow: TON SITON AUXANOUSIN hO TE hHLIOS KAI hOI IMBROI, but if he wants to
> say that the grain is growing/increasing (i.e. undergoing the process of
> growth) he'll use the middle-passive: hO SITOS AUXANETAI. If we add an
> agent or instrumental construction we can specify that this form
> (AUXANETAI) has a passive sense: AUXANETAI TA hRODA TWi TE hHLIWi KAI TWi
> OMBRWi, "The roses are made to grow by the sun and the rain."

When I checked the 23 instances of AUXANW in the GNT, 17 were active and 6
were MP. Of the 17 active forms, 3 were causative (and transitive): God
causes something to grow (1 Cor 3:6,7; 2 Cor 9:10). The other 14 were
intransitive. That the same word can be both transitive and intransitive
applies to the English "grow", too. I suppose that in the intransitive, the
agent is semantically implied, but grammatically unspecified. In the
transitive, the semantic patient (the plant) is the grammatical object, but
in the intransitive the semantic patient is the grammatical subject, while
the agent is understood.
Comparing the intransitive, active cases with the MP, my guess is that the
difference is a matter of focus. If the focus is on the result of the growth
process, the active seems to be used, but when the focus is on the growth
process itself, the MP seems to be used. In English, that aspect could be
shown by putting stress on the verb or adding an intensifier before the
verb. The 6 instances of MPs are:

Mat 12:32 hOTAN DE AUXHQHi ((It is small when sown, but when it GROWS, it
gets larger than...)
Mrk 4:8 KAI EDIDOU KARPON ANABAINONTA KAI AUXANOMENA KAI EFEREN hEN ...(The
imperfects create a focus on the process of sprouting and growing and the
bearing of fruit)
2 Cor 10:25 ELPIDA DE ECONTES AUXANOMENHS THS PISTEWS hUMWN (as your faith
is indeed growing)
Col 1:6 ESTIN KARPOFOROUMENON KAI AUXANOMENON (it is indeed bearing fruit
and growing)
Col 1:10 KAI AUXANOMENOI THi EPIGNWSEI TOU QEOU (and indeed growing in the
(deep) knowledge of God)
1 Pet 2:2 hINA EN AUTWi AUXHQHTE EIS SWTHRIAN (that you may indeed grow into
salvation by it)

>
> In the texts you've cited above, in 1:6 KARPOFOROUMENON is middle-passive
> as qualifying the implicit subject EUAGGELION: the gospel "is
> engaged/involved in the process of being fruitful--or "is being fruitful."
> However, in 1:10 the congregation at Colossae is exhorted to
> continue to be productive/to continue bearing fruit-- KARPOFOROUNTES
(active)
> while at the same time they are growing (AUXANOMENOI--undergoing the
process of growth.

Now, looking at the 8 instances of KARPOFOREW, 7 were active in form and one
was MP. The word itself indicates a focus on the result, because the result
is the fruit. I think the difference here between active and MP may be
slightly different, and this touches on one of the other potential aspects
of meaning of the MP, namely the beneficiary. In my understanding of the MP,
there is a focus on either the beneficiary or the experiencer.
In the 7 active forms, the beneficiary is different from the
experiencer/patient (i.e. the thing that grows). In several cases a dative
is added, like "bear fruit for God" (Rom 7:4). Likewise, the wheat bears
fruit for the benefit of the farmer (Mat 13:23 and parallel). In Col 1:10,
the believers are bearing fruit for the benefit of God and others.
The only MP form is in Col 1:6, stating that the word of the truth of the
gospel is indeed bearing fruit in the lives of the believers. There could be
both a focus on the process and the beneficiaries being the believers
themselves. The MP is normally used when the beneficiary coincide with the
experiencer, patient or agent. Or said in a different way: when the
grammatical subject is deeply involved in the experience or benefits from
it.

My thoughts,
Iver Larsen




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