[B-Greek] More of the m/p voice

John Colby colby at solutions2000.net
Fri Oct 24 16:55:48 EDT 2003


   I do thank you scholars for answering my questions. I do see now that I barely understood the m/p. I think my confusion started with this sentence in Mounce's BBG about the middle voice: "Although it has several different nuances, for the time being equate the middle with the active." This is most likely talking about verbs with different middle and passive forms. I thought that if a m/p verb could be found to be middle, it could be roughly translated as active (Oh my!). Now I know better!

    I seems that Greek voice has been discussed quite a bit on this list. Not wanting to draw this discussion out, I will ask a final question. Dr. Conrad wrote this:

"The middle-passive verb form always indicates
that the subject is undergoing an experience or process; he/she may be
doing so voluntarily or involuntarily: EGEIRETAI: "he/she wakes up"--that's
presumably involuntary, but one wouldn't understand the verb-form as having
a PASSIVE sense unless we are told that the impulse bringing about the
awakening is external, as EGEIRETAI hO NEANIAS TWi hHLIWi TWi ANATELLONTI,
"The young man is awakened by the rising sun."

My question-
Can I say, "When confronted by a m/p verb, if it does not have an external agent the sense is middle; if it does have an external agent the sense is passive"? I know Greek has (many?) exceptions, but is there a rule or principle about discerning if a m/p has an middle or passive sense? Thanks for your help.

Jonathan Colby
Guyana, South America






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