[B-Greek] Romans 2:4 adjective XRHSTON

George F Somsel gfsomsel at juno.com
Fri Dec 30 05:14:33 EST 2005


On Fri, 30 Dec 2005 19:19:40 +1000 "craig" <newsgroupstuff at people.net.au>
writes:
> > Usually, though not always, such a substantival adjective 
> > will have the
> > article with it to point out that its use is indeed substantival. 
> Some
> > words, such as KURIOS ("lord"), ERHMOS ("desert"), DIABOLOS
> > ("slanderous," or, as a noun, "the devil"), and hAGIOS 
> > ("holy," or, as a
> > noun, "saint"), often function as substantives without the 
> > article since
> > they are either often or usually independent of nouns in the NT. 
> Other
> > adjectives, however, usually require the article to make 
> > clear that they
> > are being used substantivally.
> > Furthermore, when the adjective is substantival, its gender 
> > is generally
> > fixed by sense rather than by grammatical concord. That is to 
> > say, if it
> > refers to a male, it will usually be masculine; if it refers 
> > to a female,
> > it will usually be feminine; if it refers to an entity or concept, 
> it
> > will be neuter.
> 
> > george
> > gfsomsel
> 
> I guess the thing that intrigued me (probably because I am not well 
> enough
> acquainted with Greek adjectives), is that often when adjectives are 
> used
> substantivally, they refer to a person or thing, so that you could 
> supply a
> word such as 'one', 'man', 'thing', 'woman' after the adjective. 
> (Although
> perhaps this is just more the case with the adjectives that don't 
> need the
> article as much..?) Whereas in the case of Rom 2:4 it seems to more 
> be
> talking of an attribute, characteristic or activity of God. Is it 
> more
> adjectival in sense to say the TO XRHSTON TOU QEOU than to say THS
> XRHSTOTHTOS TOU QEOU? Is there any nuanced difference in sense 
> between TO
> XRHSTON TOU QEOU and THS XRHSTOTHTOS AUTOU? Or is Paul just using 
> the
> adjective to not be too bland in his writing style?
> 
> Thinking about it some more, should it better be translated "the 
> good [act]
> of God"? Perhaps the noun refers to the quality in God, whereas the
> adjective is referring to what God has actually done..?
> 
> --
> Craig Johnson
> Brisbane, Australia 
__________

In the same vein, consider Rom 14.16

MH BLASFHMEISQW OUN hUMWN TO AGAQON

Here too we have an adjective (AGAQON) functioning as a substantive (and,
following Wallace's observation quoted previously, being in the neuter). 
 As a matter of fact L & N classify both AGAQOS and XRHSTOS under S.D. 88
"A Goodness."  The distinction which they note is that whereas AGAQOS
indicates "positive moral qualities" XRHSTOS is "pertaining to being
useful and benevolent."

george
gfsomsel
___________


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