[B-Greek] John 8:58 as translation Greek

Rolf Furuli furuli at online.no
Fri Feb 4 04:10:14 EST 2005


Dear Michael,

The Mishna was written in the third century C.E. and its tradition has 
no direct bearing on the OT or the NT.  Cassuto discusses this 
tradition, but he does not rule out a future meaning of EHYEH.  To try 
to concentrate on matters related to Greek (and Hebrew) grammar, the 
question is whether Jesus' use of Greek present in John 8:58 is strange 
or unusual.  My answer is No, because he hardly had any other choice 
when he should describe a state which held before a point in the past 
and still held.

In order to understand the subtleties of a Greek or Hebrew text we must 
consider lexical meaning, Aktionsart, verb form, and context.
The Hebrew verb HYH does not normally signal mere existence (it can 
signify "to be with someone" though), but it has the sense "to become; 
happen; occur".  Thus, the combination of the lexical meaning of HYH, 
the Aktionsart and 1st person singular signals that something *will 
happen* in the future (an action or an entrance into a state).  This is 
also seen in Ex 3:12 where EHYEH occurs and where LXX translates it by 
Greek future.  That is the reason I would expext a nominal clause with 
ANI rather than EHYEH in John 8:58.

The LXX rendering of Ex 3:14 is strange, both because the translators 
make a present static setting (which was foreign to the Hebrew mind) and 
because they translate the two occurrences of EHYEH differently.  (I 
neither see any original ANI HU) in this verse nor in John 8:58).  While 
translators naturally look for parallels in the OT, viewpoints regarding 
possible parallels should not dictate their translation choices, 
particularly not passages with unusual renderings such as Ex 3:14.  
Translators of the Greek NT should render the Greek text into good 
grammatical English, and let the readers decide the theology!


Best regards

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo

Michael Abernathy wrote:

> Rolf,
> I appreciate your comments.  I agree that EGO EIMI is often used to 
> translate a nominal clause. That makes ani hu a likely translation. 
> However, I cannot concede that  EGO EIMI would be an unlikely 
> translation of eyeh when it is translated in precisely that way in 
> Exodus 3:14 to identify the name of God.
> Do I understand from your comments that you would assume that the 
> original was "ani hu"?  If so, are you aware if this would have been 
> considered blasphemy or do you believe that the Mishnaic tradition  is 
> not relevant to this passage?
> Sincerely,
> Michael Abernathy
>




More information about the B-Greek mailing list