[B-Greek] Col. 1:13a causal pronoun FOLLOW Up2
waldo slusher
waldoslusher at yahoo.com
Sun Apr 18 08:49:19 EDT 2004
These examples provided by Dr. Wheeler have so far
only served to confirm to me that the PRONOUN clauses
do NOT convey the semantic implicatures that are
assigned to them. What I am having is a hard time
taking adverbial grammatical features (means, result,
concession, etc) and trying to transfer those
functions to adjectival grammatical features. What I
think Dr. Wheelers examples illustrate is the
tendency to see TOO MUCH in grammar.
However, this criticism should not be taken too
harshly. I do not disagree with the adverbial
relationships that Dr. Wheeler is "seeing" here, all I
want to say is the author of the text purposefully
avoided connecting those dots by employing a relative
pronoun. Had the author used a participial clause,
then we are to unpack the adverbial functions (pl.
since more than one is permitted), since that is what
participles grammatically require; if the author, as
here, uses a relative pronoun to connect the clauses,
no such adverbial relation is to be unpacked
GRAMMATICALLY SPEAKING.
Take for example Dr. Wheelers first example, Eph.
1:23
KAI PANTA hUPETAZEN hUPO TOUS PODAS AUTOU, KAI AUTON
EDWKEN KEFALHN hUPER PANTA THi EKKLHSIAi
hHTIS ESTIN TO SWMA AUTOU, TO PLHRWMA TOU TA PANTA EN
PASIN PLHROUMENOU
(NET Bible translation)
1:22 And God put all things under Christs feet, and
he gave him to the church as head over all things.
1:23 Now the church is his body, the fullness of him
who fills all in all.
Dr. Wheelers semantic analysis:
Result: Eph 1:23 - The result of God appointing the
Messiah to be head of the Church is that He, as
universal Sovereign, controls/fill the Church.
Although this could very well be true, one gains this
information by an understanding of Pauls larger
theological developments, not on the PRONOUN used to
introduce a subordinate clause (and how that
subordinate clause relates to the main clause). This
is what I mean by making grammar say TOO MUCH.
Again, Dr. Wheeler uses Eph. 3:11
KATA PROQESIN TWN AIWNWN hHN EPOIHSEN EN TWi CRISTWi
IHSOU TWi KURIWi hHMWN,
(NET Bible translation)
3:11 This was according to the eternal purpose that he
accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord
His semantics...
Means: Eph 3:11b - The means by which God
accomplished His eternal plan was in the Messiah.
Again, this could very well be a true statement, but
would anyone argue that this is what the text is
saying. The means is known at the historical (and
theological) level, not on the
grammatical/syntactical/semantic level.
I really think we need to be careful not to import
more into a text than it can bear. If one wants to
teach relationships, by all means do so, but I really
think we ought not to "confirm" our teachings by
appealing to these grammatical relationships.
Even with an adverbial participle, the author is not
EXPLICITLY laying out the relationship between the
clauses; he is relying on a contextual development.
That is why multiple relationships can successfully be
argued with a particular adverbial participle.
We can certainly teach relationships that exist
between clauses, but I would not appeal to the
grammar. (Dr. Conrad, who I believe would agree with
Dr. Wheeler, described this process as "divining" if I
recall; I would agree with that description more so
than appealing to a semantic one.)
=====
Waldo Slusher
Calgary, AB
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Photos: High-quality 4x6 digital prints for 25¢
http://photos.yahoo.com/ph/print_splash
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list