[B-Greek] Jn 1:1 HN (was) cf. ESTIN
Arie Dirkzwager
dirkzwager at pandora.be
Tue May 4 13:19:11 EDT 2004
I allways feel unhappy if I have to defend myself against a person who has a
point, even if I am partly or nearly right. Probably there is still some
influence of a church where Mat 5: 39 and meekness got too much importance.
I was thinking myself in the line of Professor Conrad and I saw as well that
Bauer has nearly the same commentary on EIMI as you can find in the
Categories of Aristotle.
So I overreacted. My apologies.
Arie
Dr. A. Dirkzwager
Hoeselt, Belgium
e-mail dirkzwager at pandora.be
----- Oorspronkelijk bericht -----
Van: "Jeffrey B. Gibson" <jgibson000 at comcast.net>
Aan: "Carl W. Conrad" <cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu>
CC: "Arie Dirkzwager" <dirkzwager at pandora.be>; "Oun Kwon"
<KwonO at upstate.edu>; <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Verzonden: dinsdag 4 mei 2004 18:36
Onderwerp: Re: [B-Greek] Jn 1:1 HN (was) cf. ESTIN
>
>
> "Carl W. Conrad" wrote:
>
> > At 11:00 AM -0500 5/4/04, Jeffrey B. Gibson wrote:
> > >Arie Dirkzwager wrote:
> > >
> > >> HN and ESTIN are the imperfect and the present of the same verb.
> > >> Already Aristotle saw that the verb EIMI can be used in connection
with
> > >> several kinds of information:
> > >> about substance (OUSIA, e.g. man, animal),
> > >> quantity (POSON e.g. length),
> > >> quality (POION, e.g. white, intelligent),
> > >> relation (PROS TI, e.g. half, bigger),
> > >> place (POU, e.g. in the Lyceum),
> > >> time (POTE, e.g. yesterday),
> > >> position (KEISQAI, e.g. is sitting),
> > >> situation (ECEIN, e.g. is wearing shoes),
> > >> activity (POIEIN, e.g. is cutting),
> > >> being the object of something (PASCEIN, e.g. is being cut).
> > >>
> > >> I would add that EIMI without further information means to exist (a
fact
> > >> that Aristotle knew very well too). But it remains the same verb.
> > >>
> > >> So looking from the possibilities of the Greek language you have many
> > >> possibilities if you read the verb EIMI. Finding the right
possibility is
> > >> therefore a matter of interpretation.
> > >
> > >While important to know, it cannot be assumed, given that Aristotle is
> > >writing 3
> > >centuries before John, and in Attic rather than Koine, that his
possibilities
> > >are the ones that would have been known or current when the author of
John
> > >wrote, can we? Wouldn't it be more sound methodologically to look at
the ways
> > >ESTIN/HN was used at a point in time closer to the end of the first
century CE
> > >rather than the middle or end of the 4th BCE?
> >
> > Some would say that Aristotle writes in Ionic Koine; at any rate, I
doubt
> > that his "Categories" are obsolete in the first c. C.E., or that the
usage
> > of Parmenides even earlier has faded into archaic obscurity. My quick
> > perusal of BDAG makes me think these categories are still fundamentally
> > valid. I readily grant that the synchronic perspective has its value,
but I
> > rather suspect that the range of usage of the verb EIMI is one of the
more
> > persistent features of the Greek language in antiquity. And while
there's a
> > great deal of scholarly speculation regarding the provenance of the
> > Johannine prologue from Hebraic or Greek thinking--or both--, it could
> > hardly be said that there's a solid consensus regarding the question.
>
> Quite so. And that's what I posed what I wrote as a question. In any
case, what I
> should have said was "it cannot be automatically assumed".
>
> Jeffrey
> --
>
> Jeffrey B. Gibson, D.Phil. (Oxon.)
>
> 1500 W. Pratt Blvd. #1
> Chicago, IL 60626
>
> jgibson000 at comcast.net
>
>
>
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