[B-Greek] The Tree of Life in Rev. 22:2
Juan Stam
juanstam at racsa.co.cr
Wed May 10 15:45:07 EDT 2006
Rev 22:2 seems to show influence of the "fruit trees of all kinds" beside
the eschatological life-giving stream of healing waters of Ezek 47:1-12,
especially in the phrases "will grow on both banks of the river", "every
month they will bear (fruit)", and "their fruit will serve for food and
their leaves for healing"
The Seer seems to have made a not entirely harmonious conflation of Ezk 47
with the "tree of life" of Genesis 2
Juan Stam, Costa Rica
-----Original Message-----
From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Stephen Douglas
Sent: Miércoles, 10 de Mayo de 2006 12:01 p.m.
To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] The Tree of Life in Rev. 22:2
Let me get this straight: you're saying that we should translate this
something like: "In the midst of its street and the river, [one] on this
side and [one] on the other, [is] the tree of life..." This makes a
tremendous amount of sense, if it's indeed valid (and I can't see why not).
This is really too simple (it embarrasses me for not catching it myself),
and makes me wonder why there is such an overwhelming tendency to match the
string EN MESW THS PLATEIAS AUTHS with the river, which oddly splits a road
down the middle with a river, and envisions a tree growing on two sides of
the same river.
Any other thoughts?
On 5/10/06, Harold Holmyard <hholmyard at ont.com> wrote:
>
> Dear Stephen,
>
> >I'm having a hard time deciding what to make of this passage. It says,
> >
> >(1) KAI EDEIXEN MOI POTAMON hUDATOS ZWHS LAMPRON hOS KRUSTALLON
> >EKPOREUOMENON EK TOU QRONOU TOU QEOU KAI TOU ARNIOU (2) EN MESW THS
> PLATEIAS
> >AUTHS KAI TOU POTAMOU ENEUQEN KAI EKEIQEN XULON ZWHS POIOUN KARPOUS
> DWDEKA
> >KATA MHNA hEKASTON APODIDOUN TON KARPON AUTOU KAI TA FULLA TOU XULOU EIS
> >QERAPEIAN TWN EQNWN.
> >
> >Modern translators or more likely to construe the phrase "EN MESW THS
> >PLATEIAS AUTHS" in verse 2 with POTAMON in verse 1. I don't suppose
> there's
> >any other way to take the phrase "KAI TOU POTAMOU ENEUQEN KAI EKEIQEN"
> than
> >as describing the Tree of Life, but this spawns my questions:
> >
> >1) Should we take the XULON as manifestly singular or should we
> understand
> >it as referencing more than one tree, as a class (this sort of tree grows
> on
> >either side of the river)? This seems problematic to me, not only
> because
> >the singular identification of the XULON here and in the following phrase
> >(along with the singular pronoun AUTOU) undeniably give the impression of
> >true singularity, but especially because the presumable allusion to the
> Tree
> >of Life in the Garden of Eden would definitely suggest a single tree.
> >
> >2) This leads to this question. How can one tree grow on two sides of a
> >river, unless it somehow bridges it? Is this tree seen as naturally
> being
> >split near the ground so that the roots are split over the tree? Is
> there
> >some sort of vegetation that does this that XULON may refer to? Does
> XULON
> >in Koine ever refer to anything besides what we'd consider a tree (a
> bush,
> >
> >
>
> HH: Another way to understand the words is that the tree is in "the
> midst" of the street and the river, with one on one side of the tree and
> the other on the other side. It may seem a bit redundant in English, but
> EN MESW may not be as clear as English "in between." For MESOS conveys
> ideas like middle, midst, or center.
>
> Yours,
> Harold Holmyard
>
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