[B-Greek] Sentence Particle H
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Sat Apr 9 07:53:17 EDT 2005
At 8:26 PM +0900 4/9/05, <moon at sogang.ac.kr> wrote:
>Hi,
>are there any comprehensive studies on sentence particle H?
>I am interested in this study, because some exegetes argue
>that H + rhetorical question can be used to discuss the ongoing
>argument from another perspective. I always thought that H +
>rhetorical question introduces an impossible alternative to the
>present statement, in order to prove the validity of the present
>statement. It is a kind of a "proof by contradiction".
Moon, you are aware, I assume, that there are two very different particles,
which, using our conventional transliteration with added accent markers,
are "H)=" (circumflexed with smooth-breathing) and "H)\" (grave accent,
smooth breathing); the former is used both as an affirmative and as an
interrogative particle ("surely"), the latter as a disjunctive particle
used to introduce rhetorical questions or offer an alternative question to
one already posed. Perhaps you should first be sure that you have these
distinguished. BDAG has a pretty clear accounting for the two, especially
the various usages of "H)\", inasmuch as "H)=" is far less common in NT
Greek. You might find the accounts in Smyth §§2856-2863 helpful also. J.D.
Denniston's half-century-old work, _The Greek Particles_ has a discussion
of "H)=" of several pages, but I think it's probably the usage of "H)\"
that you're most concerned with.
--
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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