[B-Greek] SIGATW in 1 Cor 14:30

Elizabeth Kline kline-dekooning at earthlink.net
Tue Oct 4 13:24:29 EDT 2005


Mssrs. Huovila and Buth,


On Sep 28, 2005, at 5:23 AM, Kimmo Huovila wrote:

>
> On Tuesday 27 September 2005 16:18, bitan buth wrote:
>
>> Can you use SIGA as something almost generic, unmarked?
>> MALISTA.
>>
>
> Yes, Tobit 10:7 seems to confirm this.
>

If we say that SIGAW in the present is pragmatically unmarked is it  
safe to conclude that the present has no (zero) semantic significance  
in this context? When a word is used in a certain form frequently we  
might suggest that the form does not draw attention to itself, that  
it is pragmatically unmarked. But to conclude that the form becomes  
devoid of semantic significance because it is pragmatically unmarked  
-- Do we really want to do this?

We also might want to take a look at how Paul is using the present/ 
aorist in the co-text. For starters in 1Cor 12-14 the finite verbs in  
the present are significantly more frequent (compared to aorist) than  
in the rest of Paul. Why is this? I think focusing on a single word  
SIGAW is useful but has limitations. We need to study how Paul is  
using the present/aorist in general and then specifically in 1Cor  
12-14 and then see how SIGAW fits or does not fit into this pattern.


Elizabeth Kline







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