[B-Greek] Third-person commands
Dr. Don Wilkins
drdwilkins at sbcglobal.net
Thu Nov 10 20:12:50 EST 2005
Yancy,
I readily admit that Greek and Latin grammatical terminology is not
reliable, but that's not the problem here. I think you are taking a
few elements from the syntactical/lexical context of a passage,
extrapolating a picture of the whole situation from those few
elements, and then discounting other equally valid elements because
they don't fit your picture. It's natural and easy for all of us to
do this, and potentially self-deceptive.
In your example of John 9:21, you suggest that "let him answer for
himself" is better English, and it certainly is better than the
"pony" translation. But you are assuming that the speaker really
means "let [let = "permit"] him answer" because that is what makes
the most sense to us. Indeed, you almost seem to say that the grammar
gets in the way of understanding. I am arguing for more of a "clean
room" approach, i.e. looking at the passage in depth by minimizing
the personal baggage that we bring to it. One prerequisite for that,
as I mentioned before, is to determine what options the speaker/
writer had, and then attempt to determine why the passage is worded
as it is. In John 9:21 the speaker could easily have said "let him
answer for himself" in Greek, so why doesn't he? We may be missing
something interesting. Or, in the case of 1 Corinthians, If we find
ourselves saying, "I know Paul said this, but he must have meant
that," then we have momentarily driven off the road.
However, I do take your point. You prefer to make what I am calling
"rhetorical effect" part of the grammar of the imperative, and I
assume that you would do the same for other grammatical elements.
Feel free to correct me if I misunderstand you.
Don Wilkins
On Nov 10, 2005, at 2:11 PM, YancyWSmith at aol.com wrote:
> Don,
> I think we are all in a muddle here about an assumed
> difference between "rhetorical effect" and "grammatical meaning."
> Let me propose a counter example that turned up in my beginning
> Greek class today. We were reading John 9:21
>
> HLIKIAN ECEI,
> AUTOS PERI EAUTOU LALHSEI
> Pony translation: Age he-has, he-himself
> concerning himself he-will speak."
> Better English: "He is of age, let him answer for himself."
>
> Now, without a doubt, the Greek has what we call a future
> indicative third person singular of LALEW, he will speak. However,
> the future indicative is being used very much like an aorist
> imperative. We also do things like this, but usually in the second
> person, e.g., "You WILL pick up your room!" So, one thing we should
> see is that part of the meaning is the mismatch between literal or
> "grammatical" meaning and intended meaning in context. Authors and
> writers, hearers and speakers take note of this fact and use it to
> rhetorical advantage all the time. But to say, "that is not the
> grammatical meaning" in this case borders on the pedantic.
> Let us say "grammatical meaning" is that meaning which one
> assigns a morpheme independent of context. Or, perhaps, it is the
> first thing one thinks of when one hears or reads something. This
> would be the sort of "meaning" one would see in a dictionary or a
> first year grammar. However, "grammatical meaning" or "meaning in
> abstract" is mostly useless for interpretation. It is like a rule
> of thumb, an abstraction and sometimes a DIStraction. This is
> especially true when New Testament writers or anyone else makes use
> of the mismatch between "usual" or "grammatical" or "literal"
> meaning to create emphasis, irony or humor.
> The meaning we are usually interested in is the meaning in
> context and the language we are usually interested in for perposes
> of interpretaion is language in use. In other words, we don't start
> with the assumption that the "grammatical meaning" is the REAL
> meaning and then try to explain away all the exceptions (like your
> "prayer language," which is really the first step down the slippery
> slope to the "deep end" you may think I have lept from.) The REAL
> meaning is the meaning that is out there in the myriad, messy,
> creative ways language is being used and was being used on the
> streets of Ephesus and with Paul as he paced back and forth
> dictating, weeping, and praying over a letter with a secretary at
> his side.
> So, now that I have proven to be a 24 carrat pedant myself,
> what has this to do with 1 Cor 7:15 CORIZESQW. The term Greek
> grammarians use for "imperative" is PARASTATIKOS -H -ON, which
> means "able to exhort" or "able to arouse." The LATIN grammatical
> term "IMPERATIVUS" comes from impero I command, levy, rule (over).
> No end of grief has come from using Latin grammatical terms for
> Greek grammar. Talk about mismatch! So, the form in 1 Corinthians
> is, we might say, a parastatic third person. Now, in this case, the
> third person parastatic is not intended, and probably CANNOT be
> intended to "exhort or arouse" the non-Christian, unless we assume
> that the Corinthians were incorrigible gossips and Paul assumed
> they would pass the note along to the unbelieving spouse, etc, etc.
> Of course its audience are the believers and it probably had all
> sorts of intended and unintended effects. But, again, what is the
> meaning for the hearers of the letter?
>
> Yancy
>
>
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