[B-Greek] Future tense in Mt. 22.37,39
George F Somsel
gfsomsel at juno.com
Thu Oct 20 11:33:34 EDT 2005
On Thu, 20 Oct 2005 10:04:14 -0500 Richard Greene
<richardgreene at insightbb.com> writes:
> Almost all the translations have "Thou shalt. . ." or "You shall."
> This
> seems to me to have a strong sense of "You must. . .," or "You are
> to. . ."
>
> But the verbs are future indicative, aren't they? (AGAPHSEIS)
> _
> Wouldn't "You will. . ." be the most natural translation?
>
> Or, to put it another way, What is the force of the future
> indicative
> in these two verses.
>
> Richard W. Greene
> Princeton, Illinois
______________
Wallace, _Greek_Grammar_Beyond_the_Basics_, p. 569 f. refers to this as
an "imperatival future" and states
The future indicative is sometimes used for a command, almost always in
OT quotations (due to a literal translation of the Hebrew). However, it
was used in this manner even in classical Greek, though sparingly.
Outside of Matthew, this usage is not common.
Note that he says this is only used sparingly in classical but is used
almost always in the NT in OT quotations. This is almost surely under
the influence of the LXX which uses the future in the Shema e.g.
AKOUE, ISRAHL, KURIOS hO QEOS hHMWN KURIOW hEIS ESTIN, KAI *** AGAPHSEIS
*** KURION TON QEON SOU EC hOLHS THS KARDIAS SOU KAI EC hOLHS THS YUXHS
SOU KAI EC hOLHS THS DUNAMEWS SOU.
george
gfsomsel
___________
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