[B-Greek] kosmos in 1 Pt. 3:3
George F Somsel
gfsomsel at yahoo.com
Wed Aug 30 05:43:48 EDT 2006
Almost every language has homonyms, words that sound alike and even look alike but mean something different. How do you know that "bear" is an animal and not a verb "to carry" in a sentence such as "There was a bear in the middle of the road"? For one thing, the sentence would not have a verb in that context. For another thing, you may have been talking about driving through Yellowstone National Park or some other context in which you would encounter wild animals. The answer is thus CONTEXT. I don't think that in the Roman Empire of NT times they had a "Garment World" chain. Here, however, the two senses of KOSMOS are not so radically different. In the LXX of Gen 1.1-2.4a (the first creation story) the earth (GH) is described as AORATOS and AKATASKEUASTOS in the beginning. It is only after the creative acts of God that it is then said KAI SUNETELESEN hO OURANOS KAI hH GH KAI PAS hO KOSMOS AUTWN. Thus it is arrangement or ordering which is the difference. Without
arrangement, it is simply "earth." It becomes a "world" through arrangement (without thereby ceasing to be "earth").
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David Koot <archierieus at yahoo.com> wrote:
Most English versions of 1 Pt. 3:3 translate kosmos as 'adornment' or 'adorning.' On what basis do they do so? I have read Kittel's article on the word, and done some additional research. I believe that for almost every other occurrence of kosmos in the NT, it means 'world.' How can they get 'adornment' out of it in 1 Peter?
David Koot
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george
gfsomsel
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