[B-Greek] Jn 1:18b EIS TON KOLPON
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Aug 18 20:22:25 EDT 2006
On Aug 18, 2006, at 6:58 PM, Craig J wrote:
>> On Aug 17, 2006, at 11:17 PM, Oun Kwon wrote:
>>
>>> Jn 1:18b hO WN EIS TON KOLPON TOU PATROS EKEINOS EXHGHSATO
>>>
>>> Source (by A. Nyland) renders (quite unlike all others)
>>>
>>> 'he is the one who led the way to the place of honor at the
>>> Father's side.'
>
> Carl Conrad:
>> But it looks to me like she's understanding that
>> phrase EIS TON KOLPON, which in the Greek construes
>> essentially with hO WN ("the one who has his being
>> in the Father's bosom") as doing double duty
>> and construing also with EXHGHSATO. And if I
>> understand her phrasing correctly, it seems to me
>> that EIS TON KOLPON is understood differently in
>> the two
>>
>> Her version in fuller context: "No one has ever seen
>> God at any time. The Only Son [reading hUIOS rather
>> than QEOS}, the One who is closest to the Father's
>> heart -- he is the one who led the way to the place
>> of honor at the Father's side."
>
> If she is making EIS TON KOLPON do double duty (in different
> senses), that
> undermines her translation, right? Can a phrase legitimately
> function in
> double duty like that?
Well, I'm not sure that it really is in a different sense, nor sure
either that it would undermine her translation; I would understand
both in the same sense: "in intimate communion with the Father."
Moreover, it's not serving in a different way than we understand the
initial QEON of John 1:18 to be functioning both as object of
hEWRAKEN in the first clause and as object of EXHGHSATO in the second.
>
> Carl Conrad:
>> This verse and especially the second clause of John 1:18
>> has a text that is problematic in many ways. There are
>> the variants QEOS and hUIOS with MONOGENHS; there's the
>> asyndeton between the clauses (just a couple days ago we
>> were arguing about whether there was contrast or
>> antithesis between the two clauses, since there's no
>> conjunction linking the clauses); there's the awkward
>> resumptive EKEINOS following upon the appositional phrase
>> hO WN EIS TON KOLPO TOU PATROS; there's the omission of an
>> explicit object of EXHGHSATO, which is what makes it
>> possible for most interpreters to supply QEON from the
>> opening of the first clause and which is evidently Ann's
>> opening to supply EIS TON KOLPON TOU PATROS from what
>> immediately precedes. ...
>
> It seems to me that the presence of WN and EKEINOS naturally divide
> up the
> clause into two parts, with EKEINOS as the subject of EXHGHSATO. If
> EIS TON
> KOLPON TOU PATROS is taken with EXHGHSATO (without doing double
> duty), that
> leaves a construction like this: hO WN EKEINOS EXHGHSATO. To me
> that seems
> very unusual, but maybe there are other examples in Greek, since I
> am not
> widely read..?
I think personally that hO MONOGENHS QEOS/hUIOS hO WN EIS TON KOLPON
TOU PATROS EKEINOS is unusual indeed; but I would understand EKEINOS
as resumptive because of the intervening participial phrase which
functions as an appositional sort of relative clause to hO MONOGENHS
QEOS/hUIOS: "The one-of-a-kind Son, the one who exists deep in the
heart of the Father, HE has made (God) known."
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad2 at mac.com
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
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