[B-Greek] 2 Peter 1:15 SPOUDASW plus two infinitives

Carl W.Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Tue Mar 14 06:27:55 EST 2006


On Mar 13, 2006, at 9:33 PM, Mitch Larramore wrote:

> Dr. Conrad:
>
> Sorry to keep posting from this chapter, but your last
> posting helped me quite a bit. Would you do me one
> last (I promise) honor by reconstructing this verse
> 15. (It is surely apparent to all that I've had no
> academic/formal Greek training. And I've come to
> realize my English is quite deficient as well.)
>
> SPOUDASW DE KAI hEKASTOTE ECEIN hUMAS META THN EMHN
> EXODON THN TOUTWN MNHMHN POIEISQAI...
>
> My difficulty seems to lie with infinitives.

Mitch, there's no need to apologize for asking questions and more  
questions: you raise good questions. Aristotle says that the right  
kind of APOREIN (confronting and resolving difficulties encountered)  
is at the heart of learning, and if we don't recognize the APORIAI as  
we come to them, we don't learn. So repeated question-asking is  
appropriate to the classroom and certainly to this would-be  
electronic classroom. It seems to me that some of our most useful  
threads have been those with follow-up questions that intensify the  
focus or call attention to what may have been missed previously.   
Perhaps I should start using emoticons again to indicate when I'm  
speaking/writing tongue-in-cheek ;-) -- I certainly was so speaking  
when I said I had noted the same verse was the subject of a previous  
question.

The construction you've raised up for consideration this time is  
sufficiently complicated that I felt it called for a closer  
examination of the larger preceding context. There's something quite  
awkward in the snippet that you have given because two of the  
infinitive phrases that follow upon the primary verb SPOUDASW have  
appeared commonly in Pauline letters with a different focus: Paul  
uses ECEIN hUMAS  (EN MNHMHi or the like) for "hold you in mind" and  
he uses MNHMHN POIEISQAI for "make mention of" or "remember." Here  
however, it is evident that the second infinitive phrase depends not  
upon the original SPOUDASW but rather upon the first infinitive ECEIN.

The larger context: 2Pet. 1:12 DIO MELLHSW AEI hUMAS hUPOMIMNHSKEIN  
PERI TOUTWN KAIPER EIDOTAS KAI ESTHRIGMENOUS EN THi PAROUSHi  
ALHQEIAi. 13 DIKAION DE hHGOUMAI, EF' hOSON EIMI EN TOUTWi TWi  
SKHNWMATI, DIEGEIREIN hUMAS EN hUPOMNHSEI, 14 EIDWS hOTI TACINH ESTIN  
hH APOQESIS TOU SKHNVMATOS MOU KAQWS KAI hO KURIOS hHMWN IHSOUS  
CRISTOS EDHLWSEN MOI, ... and that leads into the snippet about which  
you're asking.

My rendition of this prior context: So, despite the fact that you  
know and are solidly grounded in the truth accessible to you, I'll  
remind you about these matters. I think it proper, so long as I am in  
this body, to stir your recollection, cognizant that my sloughing of  
the body is close at hand as our Lord Jesus Christ has shown me ..."  
The context then is clear: Peter is close to -- or assumes that he is  
close to -- death. He claims to be confident that those to whom he  
writes are solidly grounded in "these things" -- but nevertheless he  
wants to REMIND them of what they know.

I think that a key to understanding your snippet is the phrase META  
THN EMHN EXODON: "after my departure ( i.e. after I've died)."  
SPOUDASW: "I shall endeavor" -- to do WHAT? Then we read KAI  
hEKASTOTE ECEIN hUMAS ... THN TOUTWN MNHMHN POIESQAI. I think that we  
expect hUMAS to be the object of ECEIN and ECEIN to be complementary  
to SPOUDASW. But I think actually that hUMAS is the SUBJECT of ECEIN,  
and that the sense is "I shall endeavor that you keep on keeping on  
(ECEIN) at any and every moment (hEKASTOTE) mentioning/calling to  
mind (MNHMHN POIEISQAI) these matters (TOUTWN)." Alternatively  
ECEIN ... MNHMHN POEISQAI could be "be able to mention/call to mind."

Grammatically then, I'd say that ECEIN hUMAS is the immediate  
complement of SPOUDASW and that THN TOUTWN MNHMHN POIESQAI  is the  
complement of ECEIN hUMAS.

The focus of Second Peter is the certainty of the PAROUSIA, despite  
the fact that it was promised -- so long ago -- and hasn't yet  
arrived. Here Peter endeavors mightily (SPEUDAZEI) to make sure that  
believers not ever, at any moment, let slip away the awareness of the  
long-awaited COMING of Christ in glory.

Having said all that, let me hasten to "deny accountability" for what  
I've written. I think the passage is difficult -- precisely because  
those phrases ECEIN hUMAS and MNHMHN POIEISQAI have been used  
elsewhere in slightly different senses; and it is evident that there  
are wide-ranging speculations concerning how this "snippet" of yours  
is best to be construed. You might want to look at the note on this  
in NET and the note in AT Robertson's Word Pictures.

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/




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