[B-Greek] question regarding the article as it relates to compound substantives
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at ioa.com
Wed Sep 21 13:04:26 EDT 2005
On Sep 21, 2005, at 12:35 PM, Gary Smith wrote:
> Dear List:
>
> In Acts 8:4 we have "they that were scattered abroad went every
> where preaching." The English pronoun "they" is derived from the
> Greek article `oi which is nom. masc. pl. Should this be understood
> as "the men and women" of the previous verse? Should the `oi be
> understood as the males of the previous verse thereby excluding the
> females. Normally there is agreement in gender if the article or
> pronoun refer to a previous substantive. I have searched to find a
> similar situation in the Greek text and have found none. I hesitate
> to apply this `oi to the men and women of the previous verse---I
> likewise hesitate to apply a nom. masc. pl. article to embrace the
> women of the previous verse. I desire to hear from some of you on
> this.
Text: hOI MEN DIASPARENTES DIHLQON EUAGGELIZOMENOI TON LOGON.
It appears to me that you're analyzing this in terms of the
translation you cite RATHER than in terms of the Greek text. In the
Greek text hOI is NOT the subject, rather the nominative substantive
phrase hOI DIASPARENTES is the subject. Now hOI DIASPARENTES =
EKEINOI hOI DIESPARHSAN.
To answer your question we have to refer back to 8:1 EGENETO DE EN
EKEINHi THi hHMERAi DIWGMOS MEGAS EPI THN EKKLHSIAN EN hIEROSOLUMOIS,
PANTES DE DIESPARHSAN KATA TAS CWRAS THS IOUDAIAS KAI SAMARAEIAS PLHN
TWN APOSTOLWN.
The real question, I'd think, is whether you think that PANTES in
verse 1 refers only to men--all the MEN were dispersed; I would think
that the masculine plural here is standard gender-inclusive Greek --
I don't think there's a definitive way to disprove that on the basis
of the Greek text itself.
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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