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

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Oct 24 18:16:55 EDT 2003


At 5:55 PM -0300 10/24/03, John Colby wrote:
>   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!

Careful about this! It is important not to confuse the function and meaning
of the voice-forms with how one translates any particular one into English
(or any other language, for that matter).  It is true that many Greek verbs
in the MP may be translated with an English active-voice form: ERCETAI,
"he/she comes/goes"; EGEIRETAI, "he/she wakes up." On the other hand there
are some instances where a Greek ACTIVE voice-form may need to be
translated as a passive in English: PIPTOUSIN hOI STRATIWTAI hUPO TWN
PERSWN, "The soldiers are mowed-down/felled by the Persians" or DEINA
PASCEI hO GERWN hUPO TOU hUBRISTOU, "The old man is abused dreadfully [lit.
'suffers terrible things'] by the ruffian."

>    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.

No,it's not really that simple; one reason it's not so simple is that some
MP forms pretty clearly imply an external agent or cause that's not made
explicit in the sentence, and sometimes there's some ambiguity, as in
BAPTIZONTAI hOI PISTEUSANTES, which may be taken as a passive, "Those who
believed are being baptized," or it may imply deliberate choice and so is,
"Those who believed have themselves baptized." This last sentence reveals,
in my opinion at least, a subtlety in the form which traditional
grammarians don't adequately discern. Are those who have believed put
through the ritual of baptism by others? Certainly; so it's passive, right?
But in fact they undergo the ritual by choice and participate in it; does
that mean it's really middle? In my opinion it's a mistake to insist that
BAPTIZONTAI in such a clause MUST be EITHER middle OR passive. The
voice-form is called "middle-passive" -- and that means, to cite Iver's
formulation from earlier today, that the grammatical subject is deeply
involved in the process indicated by the verb or benefits from it. I would
add, as I've indicated before, that the verb form does NOT imply that the
grammatical subject deliberately wills the action of the verb, nor does it
rule out the possibility that he/she does so. KEIRETAI hH GUNH may mean,
"The woman is cutting her own hair" or "The woman is having her hair cut."
And in the latter case she may be having her hair cut because she has gone
to a salon with a wish to have this done or it could just as well mean that
she is dragged screaming to someone who shears off her golden tresses very
much against her will.
-- 

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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