[B-Greek] Mark 6:43; 8:8; 8:19-20 -- full, fullness, etc.

J. Ted Blakley jtedblakley at gmail.com
Wed Aug 3 12:23:21 EDT 2005


I am trying to work through a few passages in Mark which appear to
have some idiosyncratic grammar and would appreciate any comments. All
of the passages have to do with the feedings in Mark and specifically
the words used to qualify the baskets of fragments that were taken up
following the feedings, namely, PLHRWMA, PLHRHS, and PERISSEUMA.

**********
Mark 6:43
KAI HRAN KLASMATA DWDEKA KOFINWN PLHRWMATA KAI APO TWN ICQUWN

I take it that KLASMATA is the direct object thus "they took up
broken-pieces" and clearly 12 baskets were filled but...
1. Why is DWDEKA KOFINWN in the genitive?
2. But more importantly what is PLHRWMATA doing? Why accusative? Why
plural? Why use a noun here and not an adjective?

**********
Mark 8:8b
KAI HRAN PERISSEUMATA KLASMATWN hEPTA SPURIDAS

I take it that PERISSEUMATA is the direct object HRAN and KLASMATWN is
a genitive of contents (or some such label), and so I arrive at the
following translation "And they took up the remains of the
broken-pieces, seven baskets."

1. My main question is how is hEPTA SPURIDAS functioning? It is plural
accusative and so I thought perhaps an appositive of PERISSEUMATA but
that seems a little strange to me, so I am not sure what to make of
it?
 
**********
Mark 8:18b-20
KAI OU MNHMONEUETE hOTE TOUS PENTE ARTOUS EKLASA EIS TOUS
PENTAKISCILIOUS POSOUS KOFINOUS KLASMATWN PLHREIS HRATE LEGOUSIN AUTWi
DWDEKA hOTE TOUS hEPTA EIS TOUS TETRAKISCILIOUS POSWN SPURIDWN
PLHRWMATA KLASMATWN HRATE KAI LEGOUSIN AUTWi hEPTA

Here I just want to focus upon the two questions:
POSOUS KOFINOUS KLASMATWN PLHREIS HRATE;
POSWN SPURIDWN PLHRWMATA KLASMATWN HRATE;

The first question makes sense to me. POSOUS KOFINOUS is the
accusative direct object of HRATE and KOFINOUS is qualified by a
genitive of contents, KLASMATWN, and a plural accusative adjective
PLHREIS. Thus "How many full baskets of broken-pieces did you take
up?"

The second question is really where the problems lie, given that the
cases have changed.
1. Why is POSWN SPURIDWN genitive? One might naturally consider it to
be a genitive direct object but BDAG doesn't present AIRW as taking
genitive direct objects.

2. And if one goes with a genitive direct object then how does one
explain PLHRWMATA.

The meaning of these two questions is not really an issue but the
grammar is. It's odd but when you look at these two questions in
parallel you will notice that where the first line has an accusative
the second has a genitive and vice-versa although this is achieved in
two different ways. With the first pair of words the case has been
changed, but with the second pair of words the order has been
switched. This would seem to be quite intentional (as is Matthew's
exact parallelism at this point (16:9); not to mention the almost
exact parallelism between Matt 14:20-21 and Matt 15:37-38).

3. The question I have is whether this seemingly intentional wholesale
modification of cases results in grammar that is highly idiosyncratic?

Sincerely,
Ted

 
-- 
J. Ted Blakley
PhD Candidate — University of St. Andrews, Scotland
Biblical Studies (Gospel of Mark)
www.blakleycreative.com/jtb


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