[B-Greek] John 8:58 and Gen 17:1 (LXX)
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Feb 17 06:58:24 EST 2005
At 8:46 PM -0800 2/16/05, Doug Hoxworth wrote:
>I don't want to resurrect this whole thread (since I
>know that this was just recently discussed) nor do I
>want to bring up any theological issues. But I wanted
>to bounce an idea off of you all for discussion
>because I found something that I found very intriguing
>about John 8:58 and Gen 17:1 in the LXX.
>
>People were bringing up Exod 3:14 and some texts in
>Isaiah (I think this was George Somsel) as parallels.
>Out of curiosity, I thought I'd do a search to find
>EGW EIMI in the LXX and Genesis 17:1 came up. What I
>found was that there were a number of similarities
>that seem to suggest that this was what Christ was
>alluding to. Here are the texts:
>
>Gen 17:1 EGENETO DE ABRAM ETWN ENENHKONTA ENNEA, KAI
>WFQH KURIOS TWi ABRAM KAI EIPEN AUTWi EGW EIMI hO QEOS
>SOU, EUARESTEI ENANTION EMOU KAI GINOU AMEMPTOS
>
>John 8:56 ABRAAM hO PATHR hUMWN HGALLIASATO hINA IDHi
>THN hHMERAN THN EMHN, KAI EIDEN KAI ECARH 57 EIPON OUN
>hOI IOUDAIOI PROS AUTON PENTHKONTA ETH OUPW ECEIS KAI
>ABRAAM hEWRAKAS; 58 EIPEN AUTOIS IHSOUS AMHN AMHN LEGW
>hUMIN, PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI EGW EIMI
>
>The language was somewhat similar and both are
>discussing Abraham (something which the other proposed
>allusions lacked). For example, EGENETO/GENESQAI;
>ABRAM/ABRAAM (change of name in Gen 17:5 from ABRAM to
>ABRAAM); ENENHKONTA/PENTHKONTA; ETWN/ETH; WFQH/IDHi;
>EIPEN AUTWi/EIPEN AUTOIS; EGW EIMI/EGW EIMI
Quite frankly, I think that the supposed similarities are really
superficial and wanting in significance.
(1) The reference to age in years as a deictic point of reference is hardly
uncommon;
(2) EIPEN used with a dative is so frequent as to need no counting.
(3) I'm not sure why the change of name should be thought significant
here; after Gen 17:5 the form ABRAAM is standard in the LXX (210x)
and it is standard in the GNT (73x: the form ABRAM is NOT found in
the GNT).
(4) IDHi + acc. direct object/WFQH + dative: while these forms are
suppletions associated with the same composite irregular verb built
on three different roots (hORA, wEID/wOID/wID, OP), the usages in
these two phrases are fundamentally different: hINA IDHi is in effect
an infinitive following upon HGALLIASATO and does mean "to see" while
WFQH with dative is the standard formula for a supernatural vision
("appeared to ...").
(5) GINOMAI is an ancient and versatile verb in Greek, occurring both as a
copula with a predicate phrase and as indicator of an event of generation
or coming into being. In Gen 17:1 EGENETO is a copula, functioning as an
equivalent of an aorist of EIMI which has no aorist: "Abraham was
ninety-nine years old ..."; in John 8:56 the infinitive GENESQAI indicates
an event of birth; the usage of this work-horse verb in the two texts is
very different.
(6) EGW EIMI; there continues to be dispute over whether EIMI in John 8:58
is existential ("I exist") or a copula with an implicit predicate-word ("I
am he"); in Gen 17:1 EIMI is unquestionably a copula linking the speaker's
EGW with the predicate nominal expression, hO QEOS SOU, a rather weak (I'd
say) Greek formulation of the original Hebrew ANI EL-SHADDAY, wherein the
copula is implicit rather than expressed.
(7) Is it supposed that either Jesus in the confrontation narrated in John
8 or the evangelist who composed the narrative had the GREEK LXX text of
Genesis 17:1 in mind in formulating the phrasing of John 8:58?
>In addition, this would explain their attempt to stone
>Him, if He was making an implicit claim (leaving off
>the hO QEOS SOU as a sort of aposiopesis or something)
>to deity. To me this all works well because the
>allusion includes many parallel words and discusses
>the age of Abraham at which time the Lord appeared to
>Him to discuss the Abrahamic covenant which we find
>that later Christ came to fulfill (cf. Gal 3:6-9, 16).
>In other words, when Abraham saw the Lord in the
>cutting of the Abrahamic covenant (and of Gen 17), he
>saw Jesus' day and rejoiced in it.
>
>Anyway, I looked through all of my commentaries and I
>hadn't seen this text proposed as an illusion and I
>wanted to submit here for peer review. So please let
>me know your thoughts. Thank you.
I'm sorry to be pouring cold water over this hypothesis; others may find it
appealing; I think it's interesting but insubstantial in the face of the
critical questions. I'm pleased that you've boldly presented your ideas to
this forum and I honestly hope that you won't be deterred from continued
exploration of instances of verbal or phraseological similarity between
Greek texts--I guess this is a matter of what's called "intertextuality."
--
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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