[B-Greek] Control by Spirit

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Sat Jan 22 10:00:39 EST 2005


At 10:18 AM -0500 1/21/05, Kenwuest wrote:
>This is my first post to this mailing list.

I think some sort of response is called for here,  although want of a
subject-header suggests that the real focus of discussion here is not very
sharply delineated. I'll take a stab at it, although I'm not sure that what
I find of interest here is what is most of interest to the sender.

>I am working on something.... look at Romans 8:4-8 (control by the flesh
>vs. control
>by the Holy Spirit).  8:9-11 identifies that those "controlled by the Spirit"
>are Christians; those controlled by the Sinful Nature are unsaved.  Romans
>8 is
>about STATE--contrasting believer with unbeliever (such as John 3
>contrasts the
>two with the issue of continued belief vs. continued unbelief).  I wonder
>how Gal.
>5 and Eph. 5--dealing with COMMAND relates--"walk by means of the Spirit"
>(Gal. 5:16-25) and "be filled by means of the Spirit" (Eph. 5:18) vs.
>being controlled by the sinful nature.

(1) I'm not altogether content with the distinction here offered between
STATE and COMMAND; while I can readily discern the COMMAND,  I rather think
that these present-tense forms have more to do with a process than with a
condition, and I'd say that even of EINAI in Rom 8:5 (hOI GAR KATA SARKA
ONTES .. hOI DE KATA PNEUMA (ONTES) ...; I rather think that these
substantive participial phrases indicate the same persons/types of persons
as the participial phrases in 8:4 ... TOIS MH KATA SARKA PERIPATOUSIN ALLA
KATA PNEUMA-that is to say, it seems to me that the verb EINAI in hOI KATA
SARKA ONTES is not merely a copula but is existential: those who "exist" in
terms of Spirit are those who "walk in terms of Spirit." That is to say, it
seems to me that this kind of "existence" involves deliberate and
responsible behavior in accordance with the guidance of Spirit. And that
has a bearing too on how we understand the imperatives and the function of
the morphological middle-passive forms.

>Notice Gal. 5:18 has "But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law"
>(NIV)--STATE.... similar to Romans 8:14--"those who are led by the Spirit of
>God are sons of God." (NIV).
>
>In Greek, the statements in Romans 8, Eph. 5, and Gal. 5, appear to be
>almost identical.
>Could being controlled by the Spirit be not so much a command for
>believers but
>the state in which they are normally?  Eph. 5:18--"be filled by means of the
>Spirit" , however, is imperative, passive (but also is present tense, refering
>to continual state).  Passive also indicates that this is a state, I
>think.  A command,
>but one in which something is done to us.  "Spirit" is in the dative of
>instramental case (just as "faith" in Hebrews 11--"by means of faith"--is
>dative of instramental).  What if, "be filled by means of the Spirit"
>refers not to control of the Spirit, but the Spirit filling us with
>spiritual content
>(as Daniel Wallace and Peter T. O'Brien--who D.A. Carson was the best on
>Ephesians,
>offered as comment on Eph. 5:18)?  "En" means "in" and is in
>this verse, but is usually translated as "by", I think, even though it
>means--"in"... could it be the verse means--"be filled with spiritual
>content by means of and in the sphere of the Spirit"?  Could "en"
>be an other evidence that this is to be a state?

(2) EN + dative in earlier Greek was fundamentally a locative usage, but
there are a few instances even in older Attic of EN + dative in an
instrumental sense, and the evidence is abundant that EN + dative, while
still commonly enough bearing a locative sense, is also very commonly used
to express instrument, so that we must understand EN less as bearing any
locative sense of spatial or temporal position than functioning simply as a
preposition used with a dative-case form rather than letting the
dative-case form function by itself to convey the alternative senses that a
dative case may indicate. At any rate, I don't think that the use of EN
PNEUMATI implies a STATE but rather an instrumentality. NET has a fine note
(#26 on Eph 5:18) which I won't cite here but point to,  as it's readily
accessible on-line.

>Gal. 5:16--"walk by means of the Spirit" ("Spirit" is dative)
>is also a command--"walk" is imperative and also present tense (state?)...
>but differently from Eph. 5--it is active (not passive).
>Gal. 5:25--"if we live by means of the Spirit, by means of the Spirit also
>walk" (Spirit is dative in both cases).  "Walk", again, is a
>command--imperative
>and present tense (state?)...  "live" is a state, I would say... not a
>command--but something that is the state of a believer--it is indicative
>(not imperative),
>present tense... but also active.  The "kai" here I transated not as its
>normal translation of "and", but "also".  "Walk" here
>is present (state?), active... but is subjunctive, meaning something that
>may possibly
>happen, but might not--it is not a definite (notice, however, the mood of
>command--imperative--is
>not used).
>
>What do you think?

(3) Finally, the matter of the imperatives and the voice of the imperatives
(I've already indicated that I think the present tense in these instances
doesn't indicate a STATE but rather a PROCESS; indeed Rom 8:4-6 seems to be
saying that hOI KATA SARKA PERIPATOUNTES and hOI KATA SARKA ONTES discern,
reason and make moral judgment (FRONOUSIN) in terms of Flesh (or 'Sinful
naure').

Gal 5:25 EI ZWMEN PNEUMATI, PNEUMATI KAI STOICWMEN. I don't think that
ZWMEN indicates a STATE in any sense of a condition or status; surely more
than "being alive" is meant by this phrase ZHN PNEUMATI, and I think it
means exactly the same as in the other passages cited KATA PNEUMA
PERIPATEIN and KATA PNEUMA EINAI. It's true that STOICWMEN is subjunctive;
yes it might possibly not happen, but this is a hortatory subjunctive and
thus comparable to the imperatives in other parts of the passages here
under discussion. STOICEIN, moreover, is surely synonymous with PERIPATEIN.
"Walking," whether in a literal or metaphoric sense, is not simply a state
but a deliberate ongoing activity.

And that's the point I'd particularly want to call attention to with regard
to the imperative PLHROUSQE [EN PNEUMATI] (Eph 5:18) and the indicative
AGESQE [PNEUMATI} (Gal 5:18). BG veterans know I have a bee in my bonnet
about middle and passive voice and that I think there's reason enough that
Greek has only one form to express the verbal notion of the grammatical
subject as focal point of the behavior/experience indicated by the verb:
like the English idiomatic "gets + passive participle," these
middle-passive forms point to an alteration undergone by the grammatical
subject, whether through the subject's own willing consent or desire or
involuntarily. I'd say that the imperative PLHROUSQE in Eph 5:18 is
middle-passive and a command delivered on the assumption that those to whom
the command is addressed must consent and will the filling with/by Spirit,
and I'd say too that the indicative form AGESQE in Gal 5:16, although
indicative, is part of a condition in a context in which the writer is
clearly urging those whom he addresses to LET THEMSELVES BE LED BY SPIRIT:
IF they will let that happen, THEN they will SURELY NOT fulfill what
"Flesh" or "Sinful nature" desires to do. Wallace refers to this usage of
the Middle voice as a "permissive middle" (GGBB, p. 427).

In sum, then,  I think that these verb forms in the Greek texts under
discussion are significant in the implications of the imperative and
middle-passive forms: living, walking, existing by Spirit are not, I think,
simply STATES but rather are deliberate engagements by believers in
everyday existence, and the verbs in question ought not to be viewed as
PASSIVE in any sense that those being addressed are pieces on a chessboard
being manipulated by a divine hand on high. That seems to be the
implication even of the usage of hUPOTASSETAI Rom 8:7 TO FRONHMA THS SARKOS
ECQRA EIS QEON, TWi GAR NOMWi TOU QEOU OUC hUPOTASSETAI, OUDE GAR DUNATAI.
"Sinful nature's mentality is hostile towards God: it doesn't subject
itself to God's law-it doesn't even have the capacity to do so." The
believer, on the contrary, CONSENTS TO, COOPERATES with the guidance of
God's Spirit. In terms of what the Greek of these passages seems to me to
indicate, the believer is not a puppet whose strings are being pulled but
rather one who is cooperating with a power enabling him/her to become what
he/she ought to be and do what he/she ought to do.
-- 

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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