[B-Greek] Validity of the Attributed Genitive (LONG)

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Sat Dec 18 13:49:56 EST 2004


Subsequent to the exchange which I have cited in part below, I was
contacted off-list by a lurker who informed me of a paper by Barry Joslin,
a former student under Dan  Wallace, entitled "The Legitimacy of The
Attributed Genitive." It is accessible at

	http://www.bible.org/page.asp?page_id=1828

Having had time to read and mull over Mr. Joslin's paper, I am still am not
satisfied that there's any reason to acknowledge a legitimate subcategory
of the adnominal genitive to be named "Attributed Genitive."

I can see that there is some grounds to suppose there's an idiomatic usage
in such "N-Ng" phrases, as Joslin refers to them conveniently. One might
even argue that they are first found in such expressions as Homer's
periphrastic naming phrases, "sacred strength of Telemachus," "mighty
strength of Odysseus," brute-strength of Heracles," "brute-strength of
Aeneas"--these being equivalent, it has been argued, to "strong
Telemachus," "mighty Odysseus," "mighty Heracles," and "mighty Aeneas."

(hIERH) IS THLEMACOIO Od 2.409 and 6x in addition
(KRATERH) IS ODUSHOS Od 23.720
BIH hHRAKLHOS Il 15.117
AINEIAO BIH Il 20.307

More often than not such phrases involve abstract nouns of quality followed
by genitive of that thing or person wherein the quality is said to reside.

The argument about the "attributed genitive" strikes me as a
20th-21st-century version of the contention between realists and
nominalists over the ontological status of concepts. Greeks (and speakers
of many other languages as well) have tended to highlight qualities
adhering to things or individuals with abstract nouns, many of them formed
by denominative suffixes in -IA, -THS, KTL or by suffixes added to verbal
roots such as ANAKAINWSIS, APOKALUYIS, NEKRWSIS, MAKARISMOS.


In this case the concepts are AGAPH, ALHQEIA, hAMARTIA, ANAKAINWSIS,
APOKALUYIS, APOKARADOKIA, ASQENEIA, BAQOS, DIAKRISIS, DIKAIWSIS, DOULEIA,
DOXA, DUNAMIS, EKLOGH, EULOGIA, QELHMA, KAINOTHS, KATALLAGH, MAKARISMOS,
NEKRWSIS, PALAIOTHS, PERISSEIA, PIOTHS, PISTIS, PLHRWMA, PLOUTOS, PNEUMA,
OIKTIRMOS, hUPAKOH, FOBOS, FUSIS. Many but not all of these are abstract
nouns closely related to adjectives, e.g. ALHQEIA - ALHQHS, ASQENEIA -
ASQENHS, BAQOS - BAQUS, PALAIOTHS - PALAIOS, PERISSEIA - PERISSOS, PIOTHS -
PIOS, PLOUTOS - PLOUSIOS. The account offered by those who espouse the
"attributed genitive" is that these abstract nouns function as adjectives
that govern the genitive noun that depends upon them.

Joslin has analyzed N-Ng constructions in a selection of Pauline letters
including Rom, 1&2 Cor, Gal, Eph, Phil, and Col within a context of three
words. Among these he found several "clear examples" of the "Åttributed
Genitive." I shall consider just a very few of these; anyone who wishes may
read Joslin's article at the site indicated by the above URL.

Rom 4:19 THN NEKRWSIN THS MHTRAS SARRAS Joslin equates this to "the dead
womb of Sarah," but I would argue that NEKRWSIS is not an abstract noun
derived from the adjective NEKROS/A/ON but a verbal noun of the -TIS/-SIS
type indicating a process. BDAG properly displays as the first sense 'death
as process, death, putting to death'; secondly 'cessation of a state or
activity, deadness, mortification'--[i.e., deadness as an end-result of the
process] and then says of the passage in question, "of the state of being
unable to bear children because of passage through menopause: the deadness
of Sarah's womb."

My question here is: do we gain something in exegetical precision by saying
that THN NEKRWSIN THS MHTRAS SARRAS means "Sarah's dead womb"? Granted, we
can understand what is meant by that phrase, but it seems to me that the
choice of the word NEKRWSIS points to the process of atrophy rather than to
the end-state, like the 'drying-u"p of a well." At any rate, I think that
the Greek would bear a weaker force, had Paul written THN NEKRAN MHTRAN
SARRAS.

Rom 4:6 KAI DAUID LEGEI TON MAKARISMON TOU ANQRWPOU hWi hO QEOS LOGIZETAI
DIKAIOSUNHN CWRIS ERGWN. This Joslin Englishes as "Just as David also
speaks of the BLESSED MAN to whom God reckons righeousness apart from
works." I would think it more accurate to David pronounces the blessing
upon the man ..." Again the noun MAKARISMOS is verbal; BDAG displays as its
sense "pronouncement of being in receipt of special favor, blessing." I
believe that Joslin has misunderstood the clear sense of the Greek and
essentially diluted it.

Better candidates, I would think, for the "attributed adjective" are those
wherein the head noun is an abstract derived from an adjective: PERISSEIA
from PERISSOS/H/ON, KAINOTHS from KAINOS/H/ON, ASQENEIA from ASQENHS/ES.

Rom 5:17 THN PERISSEIAN THS CARITOS, Englished by Joslin as "the ABUNDANT
GRACE" as equivalent to PERISSHN CARIN

Rom 6:4 hOUTWS KAI hHMEIS EN KAINOTHTI ZWHS PERIPATHSWMEN. Englished as "so
we too might walk in NEW LIFE" as equivalent to KAINHi ZWHi

Rom 6:19 ANQRWPINON LEGW DIA THN ASQENEIAN THS SARKOS, Englished as "I am
speaking in human terms because of your WEAK FLESH", where ASQENEIAN THS
SARKOS is equivalent to ASQENH SARKA

While I would concede that these three N-Ng phrases are to some extent
semantically equivalent to phrases wherein the Ng is the head-noun and the
N is an adjective, I don't think they are QUITE equivalent to such phrases.
Rather the choice to use a noun instead of an adjective in these phrases
and to append the second noun in the genitive serves to highlight the
quality indicated by the head noun. I'd say that in these phrases Paul does
indeed spotlight the head noun, "abundance," "newness," and "weakness."

Joslin argues the exact opposite, "Finally, one must note the exegetical
significance of the attributed genitive. This category of genitive is
indeed exegetically significant, given that when it occurs, the exegetical
'spotlight' shines on the trailing genitive, rather than on the head noun."
To me this seems altogether false. And rather than assert, as the epithet
given the construction would seem to imply, that the genitive noun in these
phrases is actually the noun to which the quality indicated by the head
noun is ATTRIBUTED, I would even prefer to say that the genitive noun in
these phrases is rather the noun of which the quality indicated by the head
noun is PREDICATED; thus:

Rom 5:17 "the grace that is (surprisingly) ABUNDANT"
Rom 6:4  "In life that turns out to be NEW"
Rom 6:19 "because the flesh turns out in fact to be WEAK"


Joslin's assertion that this construction spotlights the trailing genitive
runs quite counter to the observation of G.B. Winer, cited early in
Joslin's article as one of the few who have discussed this so-called
construction:

"G.B. Winer, for example, in his discussion of adjectives, notes the
adjectival function of this N-Ng construction. He writes, 'This mode of
expression [substantive governing a genitive] is not arbitrary, but is
chosen for the purpose of giving more prominence to the main idea, which,
if expressed by means of an adjective, would be thrown into the
background.' Zerwick, too, describes such usage as 'the use of a
substantive for an emphatic adjective.' Thus, exegetically speaking, this
particular usage of this genitive construct (later given the name
'attributed genitive' by Wallace) is purposeful on the part of the author
due to its force being stronger than a mere adjective."

Winer and Zerwick are right here, in my opinion, to observe that a phrase
like KAINOTHS ZWHS is NOT really equivalent semantically to KAINH ZWH. And
it is NOT, after all, ZWH that is emphasized here but KAINOTHS, the fact
that the ZWH is KAINH. But what this means, I think, is that, if we really
want to endow this construction with a name of its own, it might make more
sense to speak of a "predicated noun." My own preference would be to drop
the whole subcategory and set out to analyze each instance of adnominal
genitive as we come to it, if it really calls for analysis. In my opinion
it is a questionable practice to subcategorize the instances of something
like the adnominal genitive, even as an aid to translation--and it doesn't
seem to me to be that fruitful exegetically; it is the more questionable if
it leads one to suppose that in the phrase  EN KAINOTHTi ZWHS the
highlighted word is ZWHS.

In response to a message of Rod Rogers of 12/14/04,:
> [material omitted]
>My question(s) is, "Is it necessary to disregard contextual inflection,
>i.e. the head noun vs. the genitive noun (omit the of in translation
>between the head noun and genitive, and change the head noun into its
>corresponding adjective). If there were no "Attributed Genitive" category
>would we be unable to translate this construction? Is it necessary to cast
>doubt on the ability to diagram this construction in a "normal" way? Why
>can't the anarthrous use of PNEUMA be sufficient exegetical grounds to
>prove that Paul was not asking for the Holy Spirit Himself to be given
>which Paul had already discussed in verses 13,14 and that Paul was
>"obviously"(?) asking that spiritual wisdom and understanding be given to
>these believers?"
>
>Is it possible to discard the "Attributed Genitive" instead of
>"diagramming" and let the grammar AND context play a part in the
>"exegetical mileage" (as Wallace puts it) we get out of the genitive case?
>I may look like a piece of Swiss cheese when the bullets stop flying, but
>I'd still like to hear from ya'll.
>
>It's hard to imagine that this has not been discussed previously, but I
>honestly don't remember when. If anyone can point me to previous messages
>in this line of thought I'd appreciate that also.

I responded on 12/15/04:
>
>I don't know that this ever HAS been discussed on this list previously;
>there's been more discussion, certainly, on the "attributive" genitive. I
>had to check and read through the relevant section of Wallace to see his
>diagram and to see the several examples of this so-termed category. I have
>frequently complained about Wallace's 'generous' multiplication of
>grammatical categories which he thinks may assist exegesis or translation,
>whether or not such categories have anything to do with the way an ancient
>writer thought or composed Greek. The discussion covers pages 89-91 of GGBB.
>
>I am inclined to agree with you that there is really no need to postulate a
>distinct subcategory of the genitive here. Adnominal genitives constitute a
>structural rather than a semantic category; some linkage between the noun
>in the genitive and the head noun is indicated, and it is up to the
>reader/interpreter to figure out just what that is; I think the Hebrew
>"construct-noun" in conjunction with another noun is somewhat similar, and
>one might even consider such phrases in English as "love feast"--is this a
>deluxe table entertainment enjoyed by lovers, a wholesale indulgence in
>satisfying sexual appetites, or what? It seems to me that some traditional
>descriptive terms are sufficient, if we need distinct subcategories of the
>adnominal genitive, to convey what is involved here: there's the "genitive
>of definition" wherein the genitive noun clarifies or more distinctly
>defines what is pointed at by the head noun, or there's the "appositional
>genitive" wherein the genitive noun is more or less equated with or
>synonymous with the head noun. Along the same lines, I've commented often
>(ad nauseam?) on this list on use of the terms "subjective genitive" and
>"objective genitive" as subcategories that may be useful to translators but
>that don't do much to describe the mind-set of the speaker or writer of a
>phrase such as hH TOU QEOU AGAPH, which would be just as clear if Englished
>as "God love."
>
>These categories, it seems to me, are crutches for translators and
>exegetes; they don't diminish the intellectual effort that an exegete or
>translator needs to expend on interpretation of the intended sense of such
>a phrase.
>
>Nor is the diagramming really much help. For any who don't have access to
>Wallace's GGBB p. 89, chart 9, I'll attempt an ASCII reproduction:
>
>           body                          newness
>    _________________		    _______________
>	   /				/
>          / of sin		       /  of life
>    __________________		    ________________
>
>	    =				   =
>
>           body                          life
>    _________________		    _______________
>	   /				/
>          / sinful		       / new
>    __________________		    ________________
>
>    Attributive Genitive            Attributed Genitive
>
>Certainly the upper figure corresponds to traditional diagramming; the
>problem is that the diagramming does no more than convey the syntactic
>structure; it can't resolve all the problems of the semantic relationship
>between head noun and genitive in the phrases "body of sin" and "newness of
>life."

-- 

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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