[B-Greek] Heb. 10:22 -- Perf. Pass. Ptcs & Accusatives
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Mon May 17 17:14:54 EDT 2004
At 4:32 PM -0400 5/17/04, A. Philip Brown II wrote:
>Chairein,
>
>Hebrews 10:22 reads "PROSERCWMEQA META ALHQINHS KARDIAS EN PLHROFORIAi
>PISTEWS hRERANTISMENOI TAS KARDIAS APO SUNEIDHSEWS PONHRAS KAI LELOUSMENOI
>TO SWMA hUDATI KAQARWi"
>
>I was working through this with my 2nd year Greek students and was a bit
>puzzled by the the phrases
>hRERANTISMENOI TAS KARDIAS
>LELOUSMENOI TO SWMA
>
>I took the participles as middles and the Accusatives as direct objects.
>My students took them as passives and the accusatives as accusatives of
>reference. They thought it strange to view hRERANTISMENOI TAS KARDIAS APO
>SUNEIDHSEWS PONHRAS as something we do to ourselves.
>
>BDAG parses both as middles, giving the sense of hRERANTISMENOI TAS KARDIAS
>APO SUNEIDHSEWS PONHRAS as "after we have purified our hearts of an evil
>conscience."
>
>I wasn't sure how to defend my analysis (apart from bald appeal to
>authority).
Philip, you might, if you haven't yet done so, take a look at my "Active,
Middle, and Passive: Understanding Ancient Greek Voice" at
http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/Docs/UndAncGrkVc.pdf (hold down option key
while clicking on it to download). I think that both these participles are
middle; the distinction between the middle and the passive is actually
pretty vague, inasmuch as the m-p form may mean "having gotten
(oneself/one's heart) cleansed"--one's initiative is involved even if the
agent of cleansing is another. Grammatically it is easier to understand TAS
KARDIAS as direct object than as object of a passive verb. The notion of
accusatives of reference with passive verb is time-honored but BDAG is
really right here; there's surely a parallelism, moreover, in the two
participles with their accusative objects.
--
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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