[B-Greek] AGAPAO in the NT

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Feb 5 14:56:50 EST 2004


At 1:47 PM -0600 2/5/04, Daniel Gleason wrote:
>re agape and philio in John 21:15-17.
>
>There is a lot of word play going on in the ten lines of dialog between
>Jesus and Simon. What is the target of all the word play? A definition of
>the word "Love" or something else? Let's look at the entire passage.
>
>After the disciples have breakfast of Fish and Loaves (two kinds of food),
>Jesus engages Simon the Rock in ten lines of dialog that is filled with five
>sets of synonyms or repeated names. There are two different Greek verbs for
>love (philio and agape), two nouns for sheep (arni, probaton), two verbs for
>feeding sheep (bosko, poimaino), two verbs for knowing (eido, ginosko), and
>two aliases for the names of Jesus (Lord) and Simon Petros (of-John).
>
>Religious scholars have written extensively about the kind of love (philio
>or agape) Simon the Rock had for Jesus. The word ag-ah-pay means "to love
>something dearly" while the word phil-eh-o means "to like, be fond of, or to
>be associated with something." So is Simon's love for Jesus a brotherly kind
>of love or a love of deep genuine affection? Some scholars say the meaning
>of the two words is significantly different, others say the two words are
>virtually interchangeable.
>
>I think the target of the word agape between Simon and Jesus really points
>to the "Disciple whom Jesus was-loving." Is the "love" Jesus has for Simon
>anything like the love Jesus has for the unnamed Beloved Disciple mentioned
>in verses 21:7 and 21:20-25? Is there any connection between Simon the Rock
>and this unnamed Beloved Disciple? Do you think it has anything to do with
>why Jesus calls Simon "of John."??

It is unclear to me whether this is intended as a discussion of the Greek
text of Jn 21:15-17 as read by someone who understands Greek or as a
meditation on the text as translated. It should be noted too that there is
no verb AGAPAO nor is there a FILIW; the verbs are AGAPAW and FILEW.

For what it's worth, I think it should be noted regarding the "beloved
disciple" that the verb involved there is FILEW:

John 20:2 TRECEI OUN KAI ERCETAI PROS SIMWNA PETRON KAI PROS TON ALLON
MAQHTHN hON EFILEI hO IHSOUS.

Lazarus too, it may be noted is the object of FILEW where refenced in John 11:
verse 3 IDE, hON FILEIS ASQENEI ... verse 36 IDE PWS EFILEI AUTON.

Finally, for what it's worth, in John 5:20, Jesus says, hO GAR PATHR FILEI
TON hUION ...

-- 

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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