[B-Greek] Heb 4,15
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Sat May 1 12:36:46 EDT 2004
At 8:01 AM -0700 5/1/04, Eddie Mishoe wrote:
>OU GAR ECOMEN ARCIEREA MH DUNAMENON SUMPAQHSAI TAIS
>ASQENEIAIS hHMWN, PEPEIRASMENON DE KATA PANTA KAQí
>hOMOIOTHTA CWRIS hAMARTIAS
>
>2 Questions:
>
>Regarding SUMPAQHSAI, does this word denote "sympathy"
>in the English sense or can it also denote "empathy."
>The context seems to be emphasizing his ability to
>"EMpathize" with us since he's "been there done that."
>(I hope no one is offended with that cliche). If not,
>is there a Greek word that would correspond to our
>word "empathy?"
BDAG offers s.v.SUMPAQEW: "to have/show sympathy with, sympathize with (s.
next entry) w. dat. of pers. or thing that is the obj. of the sympathy"
and the next entry is for SUMPAQHS: "sympathetic, understanding"
I think "empathize" is reasonable here; surely the sense is "share the
experience" of another--particularly the experience of one as a human being.
>Also, a suggested way of taking KAQí hOMOIOTHTA in
>this passage was to understand it as "because of his
>likeness to us." (Rather than he was tempted LIKE WE
>ARE.) I would like to hear any comments regarding this
>usage of KAQí hOMOIOTHTA.
I suspect there will be variant views on this, but I would understand KAQ'
hOMOIOTHTA here in the sense of Christ's likeness to us.
--
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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