[B-Greek] Didache TO SON and DUNASAI

Webb webb at selftest.net
Tue Dec 6 00:30:31 EST 2005


Snip: Perhaps OUDE GAR DUNASAI goes with what follows, but I'm not sure. 

Nope. I think you'd need another infinitive to get "After all, it's not even
possible to ___". As it is, you get the imperative DIDOU.

EAN LABHi TIS APO SOU TO SON MH APAITEI - OUDE GAR DUNASAI

If somebody takes something of yours from you, don't demand it back (because
you can't anyway).

Lake (editor of the version in Apostolic Fathers, I) offers the somewhat
humorous, yet reasonable, conjecture: "the whole phrase [may] be a flippant
gloss, which has been erroneously taken into the text" (p. 311 nt. 1).

I can just see it in the margin: "Because you can't anyway!" Our
hypothetical margin scribbler is reading in context of the immediately
preceding allusion to Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, where you're forced to go
a mile, and so on. He thinks: if someone takes something of yours--by
force--it's already clear that they're strong enough to retain it over your
protestations. So don't bother. Some rough-and-ready wisdom.
Frankly, I don't see how the OUDE GAR DUNASAI phrase makes any sense as
original. 
Webb Mealy






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