[B-Greek] KOSMOS

Carlton Winbery winberycl at earthlink.net
Thu Aug 31 20:59:24 EDT 2006


>
John 1:10 seems to me to be three distinct uses of KOSMOS.

EN TWi KOSMWi HN, KAI hO KOSMOS DI' AUTOU EGENETO, KAI hO KOSMOS 
AUTON OUK EGNW.

1) alludes to him being part of humanity.
2) the universe
3) humanity apart from God

It may help to understand how dictionaries are written. To write a 
diction for Greek of the Helenistic age, one must study as many 
documents from that period as one can find and then from the context 
of such written documents one learns how words are used. Its 
interesting that in a note in the KJV the translators (through the 
hand of John Reynolds) mention a word that, as far as they knew, 
occurred nowhere else in known Greek literature. They indicated that 
the translation was little more than a guess. They said that it "had 
neither sister nor brother." As George indicated dictionary writers 
observe usages in various writings and record their observations. 
translators use dictionaries to learn ranges (semantic domains) of 
usages and decide which one they observe from the context of the 
passage they are transloating. "Every translation is an 
interpretation!"

>On Thursday, August 31, 2006, at 07:20AM, William Ross 
><woundedegomusic at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>Which usage fits this passage? What is the entity KOSMOS that "loves its
>>own?" Would you see the usage to be equivalent to "humanity?"
>>
>>If so, are believers no longer part of humanity?
>
>I think you are belaboring a point of logical distinction here
>which is not really relevant to usage of the word in the Johannine
>context. From the perspective of the author, hO KOSMOS is the
>world/humanity at large OUTSIDE of the intimate Johannine community;
>the word is used in a more-or-less pejorative sense for "outsiders"
>as the great majority of humankind who are not believers and who are
>hostile to belief and believers. That is precisely why Jesus in this
>passage can say to beievers that they are EN TWi KOSMWi, "in the
>world" but are not EK TOU KOSMOU (where EK + gen. = "from" or
>"belonging to") -- the believers are not "of this world" or
>"belonging to the world." The community of believers is conceived
>here as an enclave that exists WITHIN humanity but that has set
>itself off or been set off from humanity by belief and by relationship
>to Jesus. This usage of KOSMOS depends upon an "insider's) distinction
>between "US" and "THEM." "THEY" are "the world"; "WE" don't really
>belong to "THEM." I think too that this NT distinction has its analogue
>in the traditional OT distinction between Israel as a GOY QADOSH and
>hA GOYIM, between a "holy nation" and "the nations."
>
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
>>[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Craig J
>>Sent: Thursday, August 31, 2006 1:18 AM
>>To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
>>Subject: Re: [B-Greek] KOSMOS
>>
>>>  Is John using two meanings for KOSMOS in this sentence as a
>>>  play on the word?
>>>
>>>  What is the hater here? Is it a system? Humankind? Or is it
>>>  SPECIFICALLY "the people that adhere to this world's system?"
>>>
>>>  KJV:
>>>  John 15:19 If ye were of the world <2889>, the world <2889>
>>>  would love his
>>>  own: but because ye are not of the world <2889>, but I have
>>>  chosen you out of the world <2889>, therefore the world
>>>  <2889> hateth you.
>>>
>>>  Can you see how I find "the world" to refer to a specific
>>>  subgroup of humanity in Paul/John?
>>>
>>>  William Ross
>>>  VGB, Argentina
>>
>>EI EK TOU KOSMOU HTE hO KOSMOS AN TO IDION EFILEI hOTI DE EK TOU KOSMOU OUK
>>ESTE ALL EGW EXELEXAMHN hUMAS EK TOU KOSMOU DIA TOUTO MISEI hUMAS hO KOSMOS
>>(John 15:19)
>>
>>The usage of KOSMOS seems consistent throughout this verse, not two
>>meanings, as I read it.
>>
>>Seems to fit in with what Harold said. If you take the disciples as the
>>minority, and the world as the vast majority, the negative meaning only
>>comes in by context, not by inherent meaning of KOSMOS.
>>
>>--
>>Craig Johnson
>>Brisbane, Australia
>>Blog Experiment: http://bloggledegook.blogspot.com/
>  >
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>>
>
>
>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/
>---
>B-Greek home page: http://metalab.unc.edu/bgreek
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-- 
Carlton L. Winbery
Retired Professor of Religion
Louisiana College
318-448-6103
winberycl at earthlink.net



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