[B-Greek] Another example of a qualitative QEOS

Awohili at aol.com Awohili at aol.com
Mon Jul 10 13:50:44 EDT 2006


 
Over the centuries there have been translators who took note of the  omission 
of the article in John l:1c, and translated accordingly in their  language. 
For example,  roughly 1,700 years ago, Sahidic Coptic translators  rendered 
John 1:1c as:
 
auw ne.u.noute pe pSaje.  
 
This Sahidic Coptic phrase ne.u.noute means literally, "was a god."   The 
entire sentence means literally, "and was a god the Word."
 
Coptic scholar George W. Horner ("<NOBR>The Coptic  V  <NOBR>of the New Te  
<NOBR>in the Southern Dia<NOBR>Otherwise   <NOBR>Sahidic and Thebaic," Oxford,  
translated the Coptic of John 1:1c as "and [a] God was the Word,"  putting 
unnecessary brackets around the "a."  The Coptic word noute is not  an abstract 
noun nor any other category of Coptic noun that calls for the Coptic  
indefinite article to be left untranslated.  For example, Horner himself  has no 
brackets around the "a" where the same construction is found at John  18:40:  Here,
 
ne.u.soone pe 
 
is literally translated "was a robber":  Horner has  correctly "Barabbas was 
a robber," with no brackets around the "a."
 
Thus, grammatically and literally, the Sahidic Coptic  version of John 1:1c 
translates the Greek anarthrous QEOS by the Coptic  indefinite article: "a god" 
or "a God."
 
The later (6th-8th centuries) Bohairic Coptic version  also employs the 
Coptic indefinite article to render the anarthrous QEOS, giving 
 
ne ounouti pe: "was a god" or "was a God."  
 
Solomon Landers

 
In a message dated 07/10/2006 7:38:23 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
furuli at online.no writes:

In John 1:1b  we find hO QEOS with article, and in 1:1c we find QEOS 
without article. It  is this relationship that can tell us something, not 
how John and others  use the article in other instances. "The 
Translators's New Testament,"  published by The British and Foreign Bible 
Society in 1973 says: "In the  second instance there is no article and it 
is difficult to believe that  the omission is not significant."






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