[B-Greek] 1 Cor. 13:10

George F Somsel gfsomsel at juno.com
Mon Dec 27 00:11:48 EST 2004


On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 21:56:38 -0500 John Fincher <jcfincher at charter.net>
writes:
> Question for Mr. Somsel & Mr. Hofstetter:
> 
> To Mr. Somsel: I thought that gender didn't matter in Greek, just as 
> in German, madchen (which means girl) is neuter.  Are you saying 
> that if the adjective is substantive, then gender matters?  Is there 
> other times when this is true?
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It is not quite correct to say that gender absolutely doesn't matter in
Greek.  There are cases where an author makes it clear what the gender of
his referent is by using a construction called KATA SUNESIN (according to
the sense).  It is generally the case that words will be used in the
grammatical gender determined by the dictionary form of the word. 
Language, however, is not prescriptive in its development.  It is more
like case of a city's development.  Prior to the establishment of any
zoning regulations one might say, "This is my property and I intend to
make use of every square inch of it" and then proceed to build right up
to the front property line.  Others will consider it better to set their
building further back from the street.  Eventually this becomes the norm
and laws are proposed to make this normative for all further building. 
Meanwhile the first builder says, "You can't make me tear my building
down" so his construction is "grandfathered" in.  Later the city may
decide to widen the street and take possession by eminent domain, but for
the time being his construction is accepted. In the same way there are
relics in a language.  Later someone may come along and decide to make
them conform to the custom, but in the meantime they are used.

george
gfsomsel
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