[B-Greek] Two men in one bed?
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Jul 21 11:58:06 EDT 2006
On Jul 21, 2006, at 10:42 AM, Edward Andrews wrote:
> Iver Larsen:
>
> I have a general question. Those commenting keep referring to "two
> men in
> the same" bed. What part of the Greek brings one to that
> conclusion, when
> it says "two [men] will be in one bed.' What brings us to the
> conclusion it
> is the same one bed as opposed to two men each in their own one bed?
I can't help but believe that such a sense would have been expressed
differently; what we have is DUO EPI KLINHS MIAS with what certainly
appears to be a pointed contrast between DUO and MIAS; the point of
the expression would seem to be the surprising note that two who lie
side-by-side will each suffer a fate different from that of the
other. The meaning you have suggested might be clearly expressed by
something like DUO ANQRWPOI, hEKASTOS EN THi hEAUTOU KLINHi.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Iver Larsen" <iver at larsen.dk>
> To: <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Friday, July 21, 2006 11:40 AM
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Two men in one bed?
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Fridolin Janzen" <fjanzen at gmx.net>
>
>
>> Since in Luke 17:35, Luke uses the feminine in order to describe
>> two women
>> grinding together, "MIA" and "HETERA", wouldn't that mean that he
>> purposefully uses the masculine in verse 34 in order to describe
>> two men?
>
> No, I don't think it is possible to make such a deduction. The two
> people
> grinding flour together would obviously have
> to be women, so the feminine is used. But two people in the same
> bed could
> be either two men or a man and a wife (not
> two women).
>
>> The words ANAKLINW, KATAKLINW derive from KLINE, and the
>> illustrations I
>> have from the time, show that they "always" reclined at the table
>> for the
>> meals. They did not "sit" at the table the way we do today. They
>> did not
>> use
>> chairs, they used the "KLINE", so two men could have been taking a
>> meal at
>> the "KLINE" at the event described, just like Jesus and His
>> disciples were
>> reclined during the Last Supper.
>
> There are many examples in the NT of people reclining to eat. But
> if you
> check the context of all of these, the
> expressions used and the contexts are very different from here. I
> am not
> aware that they reclined on a KLINH for a meal.
> At least there are no examples of this in the NT. They were probably
> reclining on pillows, and the food would be served
> on the table.
>
>> In Portuguese we have feminine and masculine articles in order to
>> differentiate between the two,
>> just like in German, which is not the case in English. Luther
>> differentiates, using the
>> masculine in verse 34 and the feminine in verse 35.
>
> Now that you mention the German versions, I looked up two of them. Die
> Lutherbibel is literal and as ambiguous as the
> Greek, since it says that "zwei auf einem Bette liegen". I assume
> that zwei
> Menschen is meant, so that the following
> "der eine" refers to Mensch. Mensch is masculine like ANQRWPOS, so
> there is
> a good linguistic match.
>
> The Gute Nachricht has chosen to use "Von zwei Männern, die in
> jener Nacht
> auf einem Bett schlafen".
> By using "Männern" (men) they have IMO made an unfortunate mistake.
>
> Iver Larsen
>
> Pastor Fridolin Janzen
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Iver Larsen [mailto:iver at larsen.dk]
> Sent: Friday, July 21, 2006 3:52 AM
> To: Fridolin Janzen; b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Two men in one bed?
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Fridolin Janzen" <fjanzen at gmx.net>
>
>> Luke 17:34 says that two men shall be in one "bed" (KLINE). Could "O"
> (masculine) also refer to a woman?
>> Since the meals were taken at a "KLINE", should this word not be
>> translated as "couch" or a synonym, in order for people to
>> understand the
> text properly? I used the word "divã" in my translation.
>> Do you think I am on the right track?
>
>> Pastor Fridolin Janzen
>
> No, I don't think you are on the right track.
>
> Why did you make the assumption that two men are being talked
> about? No
> English version is saying that, so it may be a Portuguese one?
> The closest is KJV which says "in that night there shall be two
> [men] in
> one bed" indicating that the word "men" is supplied, but "men" in
> those days
> meant people, not men.
>
> The Greek says:
> Lk 17:34 LEGW hUMIN, TAUTHi THi NUKTI ESONTAI DUO EPI KLINHS MIAS,
> [hO] hEIS
> PARALHMFQHSETAI KAI hO hETEROS AFEQHSETAI
>
> Since there is no noun connected to DUO, the implied noun must be
> ANQRWPOI
> (people). When a noun is to be supplied, it must come from the
> preceding
> context (not applicable here) or the most generic noun is to be
> chosen.
> ANQRWPOI (people) is more generic than ANDRES (men).
>
> Both hO and hEIS are masculine, because they refer to the implied
> ANQRWPOS.
> The same applies to hO hETEROS. The text is not difficult and the
> hO is
> optional, just like in English you could say "One will be taken" or
> "The one
> will be taken".
> The presence of the article seems to add an emphasis on the
> contrast between
> the two people. "The one person" will be taken, "the other person"
> will be
> left.
>
> The text does not tell us whether it refers to two men or a man and
> a woman.
> It is just two people. Therefore, the correct translation is "two
> people"
> like almost every English version says.
>
> I am not sure of the specific challenges in Portuguese. If you don't
> distinguish between "men" and "people" as in old English, the
> translation
> may be more ambiguous than the original Greek is, and therefore
> lead to
> potentially wrong assumptions by the readers.
>
> Also, it is unlikely to talk about lying down for dinner. Nowhere
> in the NT
> is KLINH used as a place to be reclining on for dinner. The verbs
> used for
> reclining for a meal are ANAKLINW, KATAKLINW, ANAPIPTW, KATAKEIMAI,
> (SUN)ANAKEIMAI.
>
> Iver Larsen
>
>
>
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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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