Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Adjectival and Adverbial Prepositional Phrases in Biblical Greek.

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at ioa.com
Thu May 12 16:33:58 EDT 2005


On May 12, 2005, at 1:45 PM, JAMES DAVIS wrote:

>
> Reply To: Carl W. Conrad
>
> Thank you for your reply to my question regarding "META with
> the genitive."
>
> Wallace said: Older NT grammars generally denied that
> prepositions govern their cases.

Right; but in earlier Greek it is probably preferable to say that the  
prepositions function as adverbs to clarify which of the possible  
senses of the case involved is meant. Some would argue that's still  
the case with Biblical Greek.

> Would it not be correct to say that META with the genitive
> can be an adverbial phrase ONLY if it is found in a context
> where that prepositional phrase can ONLY be said to
> characterize a verb.

No; in fact I think that almost all instances of prepositional  
phrases with META + genitive are adverbial in their sentence context.

> I have understood that META with the genitive is adjectival
> because of case. I have also understood that META with the
> accusative is adverbial because of case.

I frankly don't understand why you have had that understanding.  
Whether the prepositional phrase is adjectival or adverbial depends  
upon its syntactic usage in the clause in which it appears, NOT upon  
the case of the object of the preposition.

> My next question is: In Biblical Greek is the prepositional
> phrase META with the accusative ever adjectival or is it
> always adverbial?

I think it's usually adverbial, but a celebrated instance of a  
prepositional phrase with META + accusative is the title of Aristotle  
treatise usually Englished as "Metaphysics": TA META TA FUSIKA. Here  
the prepositional phrase is actually substantival governed by the  
article TA; it means "the things (that come) after the Physics (i.e.  
the physical things)." But you might see something like THN hHMERAN  
THN META TO SABBATON = "the day after the Sabbath." Here and  
generally it's the article enclosing the prepositional phrase that  
clearly signals that the enclosed prepositional phrase has an  
adjectival function with hHMERAN.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad2 at mac.com
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/




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