[B-Greek] him which is, and which was, and which is to come

Webb webb at selftest.net
Mon Nov 21 12:34:14 EST 2005


Well, I, for one, am going to translate it as "from the is, the was, and the
coming one", and I won't be doing it because I don't know English. In other
words, I resist the idea that it's a solecism, if that implies (as it does
to me) that John didn't know the rules of grammar well enough to know it was
incorrect. I agree that it is John's way of casting the tetragrammaton into
Greek--and the tetragrammaton isn't exactly grammatical in Hebrew either! :)
Peace,
Webb Mealy
 

-----Original Message-----
From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Carl W. Conrad
Sent: Monday, November 21, 2005 3:01 AM
To: Iver Larsen; B-Greek B-Greek
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] him which is, and which was, and which is to come


On Nov 21, 2005, at 2:47 AM, Iver Larsen wrote:

>> Rev. 1:4
>> ...from the is, the was, and the coming one.
>> (APO hO WN KAI hO HN KAI hO ERCOMENOS)
>> This sounds cool when you sound it out phonetically :
>> ahpo ho own kai ho eyhn kai ho erchomenos
>> John is being poetic. In Greek you can't really say hO HN, i.e.  
>> "the was".
>> But it sounds good with hO WN in a way similar to the way "the is  
>> and the
>> was" sounds good. John knows his Greek, and he's bending the rules.
>> Rev. 1:8
>> I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God: the is, the was,  
>> and the
>> coming one (hO WN KAI hO HN KAI hO ERCOMENOS): the all-powerful.
>
> I don't think John is "bending the rules" nearly as much as it  
> sounds from the English translation of hO with "the"
> rather than "he who"..
>
> According to BDF 249, the article hO was originally a demonstrative  
> (like English "that"). And demonstrative often have
> an implied relative function. Sometimes the relative pronoun was  
> used instead of the article. BDF also says that there
> is an Epic and dialectal use of hO hH TO as a relative pronoun.(cf.  
> "der" in German which serves as article, relative
> and pronoun).

I hardly think that the author of Revelation is mimicing Epic style  
here. What is conceivable is that he is alluding to Exodus 3:14: KAI  
EIPEN hO QEOS PROS MWUSHN: EGW EIMI hO WN, KAI EIPEN hOUTWS: EREIS  
TOIS hUIOIS ISRAHL: hO WN APESTALKEN ME PROS hUMAS.

> It seems that especially when used with a participle, the  
> distinction between the article and relative pronoun is not
> essential. "the one being" or "the one who is". "The one coming" or  
> "the one who is to come."

When used with a participle, sure: hO WN = hOUTOS hO/S ESTIN, and hO  
ERCOMENOS = hOUTOS hO\S ERCETAI (or hO\S ELEUSETAI) -- but hO  
ERCOMENOS is already attested in a LXX text cited in the GNT: Ps  
117:26 EULOGHMENOS hO ERCOMENOS EN ONOMATI KURIOU.

> Might John be using the article in hO HN as if it was the relative  
> pronoun? Maybe for poetic reasons? If so, would there
> be any papyrus evidence to suggest how common this was in Asia  
> minor at the time of John's writing? I am just wondering.

Well, I'd be curious to learn if there's any such usage to be found  
in the papyri, but I won't hold my breath waiting for it. For the  
expression found in Rev 1:4 and 1:8 APO hO WN KAI hO HN KAI hO  
ERCOMENOS we would expect in standard Greek APO TOU ONTOS KAI EKEINOU  
hOS HN KAI TOU ERCOMENOU. What we have is a perfectly intelligible  
expression that is ungrammatical, something comparable, say, to an  
English "This letter was sent by I": it is a solecism, and it is NOT  
the only solecism in the text of this author.

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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