[B-Greek] 1 Cor 14:5: present infinitive aspect

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Mon May 15 06:39:42 EDT 2006


On May 14, 2006, at 10:44 PM, Dave Smith (REL110, 211,212) wrote:

> Friends and scholars,
>
> Both infinitive and participle are substantives morphologically; the
> participle still declines, although the infiintive is now fixed.  
> Both take
> articles, verbs do not.

OK, what you mean is that they are nominal -- participles are  
inflected for number and gender and case; but they are also inflected  
verbally form tense and voice. Infinitives are inflected only  
verbally for tense and voice, and have nominal inflections only when  
the article is used with them. It was your idiosyncratic usage of the  
term "substantive" that I found confusing.

> Therefore, as words of a substantive nature, such a
> word is indefinite as far the limits of the action is concerned. I  
> think
> that is what Mantey was trying to express. I do believe that the  
> present
> infinitive may often express contemporaneous time with the main  
> verb, but
> the aorist is more apt to view an simple event. It may even be that  
> the
> aorist is a real event and the present is hypothetical, in some sense.

I find these terms "real event" and "hypothetical" (event) confusing  
also, and not particularly helpful.

> For I
> Cor. 14:5, the use of  QELW with all present or aorist infinitives,  
> not just
> LALEIN, must be considered. Even if one were to view LALEIN  
> lexically, it is
> not a action that can go on continuously, any more than walking,  
> eating, or
> drinking. It is a voluntary action, not involuntary such as  
> breathing. But
> as far as QELW is concerned, St. Paul, in at least one place,  
> wishes for
> something that he knows is not possible: "I wish all persons to be  
> as even
> myself, but each has his own gift from God. On the one hand, some  
> have one
> sort of [gift], but some have another sort of [gift]" (I Cor. 7:7).  
> Paul
> even states the hypothetical nature of his wish, realizing that it  
> was not
> possible according to the present administration of spiritual  
> gifts. The
> spiritual gift Paul wishes for all in this place is celebacy. Jesus  
> also
> said this was a special gift, not for all (Matthew 19:12).
>
> By way of comparision, Paul is setting up a hypothetical situation  
> in I Cor.
> 14:5 using the present infinitive, but a real situation in 14:19  
> using the
> aorist, i. e.  his normal practice was not to speak in tongues in  
> the open
> assembly. What St. Paul wishes in I Cor. 14:5 can not happen,  
> either now or
> then. The divine administration and alotment of spiritual gifts  
> enumerated
> in both chapters 12 & 14 makes it impossible.

I think that many might question this assertion also; over the course  
of years I've become aware of at least three quite different ways of  
understanding the entire discourse on glossolalia from different  
hermeneutical assumptions and different situational assumptions about  
the context.  I don't think that all readers of these texts will  
assent to this distinction of "hypothetical" and "real" usages of  
aorist and present infinitive.  I don't expect to find consensus on  
the meaning of 1 Cor 12-14, but I would have thought we'd find more  
consensus about the parameters for meaningful understanding of the  
"tense" of the infinitives LALEIN and LALHSAI. It appears that we  
don't find such consensus.

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Carl W. Conrad" <cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu>
> To: "Dave Smith (REL110, 211,212)" <rel21x at charter.net>
> Cc: <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2006 20:27
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] 1 Cor 14:5: present infinitive aspect
>
>
>>
>> On May 14, 2006, at 7:21 PM, Dave Smith (REL110, 211,212) wrote:
>>
>>> Folks,
>>>
>>> Let me add one other piece of information that we all know, but
>>> have somehow
>>> overlooked. Both infinitives and participles are substantives in
>>> grammar and
>>> nature,
>>
>> Unquestionably an infinitive is a substantive, but I really don't
>> know what it's supposed to mean when it is claimed that a participle
>> is a substantive; a participle functions in part adjectivally and in
>> part verbally.
>>
>>> and being so, "both are indefinite in their bearing upon the limits
>>> of action..." (Dana and Mantey, 222). The infinitive in I
>>> Corinthians 14:5
>>> cannot dictate the action. The only action that can even be  
>>> considered
>>> continuous, in the sense of on-going, would be the wishing, not the
>>> speaking. I actually think the reason Paul is using so many
>>> presents in this
>>> whole section is that the condition, or problem, was on-going, as
>>> he wrote.
>>> We also need to be careful in Corinthians, realizing that Paul
>>> sometimes
>>> quotes his opponents and sometimes speaks tongue-in-cheek. Anyway,
>>> as one
>>> post has already mentioned, the actually wish is that they would all
>>> prophesy, not all speak in tongues, and we know that the prophets
>>> were only
>>> to speak one at a time.
>>
>> But, as has been noted previously in the thread, there are present
>> infinitive forms LALEIN in 1 Cor 14:5, 34, 35, and 39, and there is
>> an aorist infinitive form LALHSAI in 1 Cor 14:19 -- and I think
>> there's a difference, LALHSAI meaning something like "get spoken"--
>> in terms of a completed action--,  and LALEIN "speak" -- in terms of
>> an active process.
>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: "Iver Larsen" <iver at larsen.dk>
>>> To: "b-greek" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
>>> Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2006 05:36
>>> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] 1 Cor 14:5: present infinitive aspect
>>>
>>>
>>>>> Along the lines of Iver's suggestion, Scott's and my friend was
>>>>> in fact
>>> given all
>>>>> the occurrences in the New Testament and the LXX of the present
>>> infinitive
>>>>> LALEIN to look up and see if they require or expect the
>>>>> translation "to
>>> speak
>>>>> CONTINUALLY." This apparently was not convincing.
>>>>>
>>>>> So, to be even more specific, this is what Scott's and my friend
>>>>> wrote
>>> (on
>>>>> another forum) that caused us both to question him on his  
>>>>> insistence
>>> that
>>>>> LALEIN in 1 Cor 14:5 means to continually speak in tongues 24/7.
>>>>> I only
>>> quote
>>>>> it all to show that this "interpretation" is also being laid at
>>>>> the feet
>>> of Greek Profs
>>>>> Jay and Blaiklock:
>>>>>
>>>>>> 1 Cor 14:5 -- "QELW DE PANTAS hUMAS LALEIN GKWSSAIS" -- "I  
>>>>>> wish, I
>>>>>> want, I desire  ALL of you to speak CONTINUALLY in tongues."
>>>>>> "I want" -- Behind Paul's words is the Holy Spirit. PAUL'S
>>>>>> DESIRE IS
>>> GOD'S
>>>>>> DESIRE TOO.
>>>>>> "all of you" -- every Xtian without exception, because 1 Cor is
>>> addressed to
>>>>>> "ALL that in EVERY place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our
>>>>>> Lord"
>>> (1:2)
>>>>>> "CONTINUALLY" -- because LALEIN is a present infinitive, which,
>>>>>> says
>>> Dr.
>>>>>> Eric G. Jay in his "NT Greek" (p.101) "The present infinitive is
>>>>>> used
>>> of an
>>>>>> action which is prolonged or repeated ... IT IS ONLY EMPLOYED  
>>>>>> WHEN
>>>>>> ATTENTION IS BEING DRAWN TO THE PROLONGING OR REPETITION OF
>>>>>> THE ACTION."
>>>>>> He  cites "hUPAGW hALIEUEIN" -- "I'm going back to the fishing
>>>>>> trade"
>>> (as
>>>>>> opposed to a nice afternoon's one-off fishing) by Peter in John
>>>>>> 21:3.
>>> And one
>>>>>> sleepless night I discovered my old Bible College lecturer Prof
>>>>>> E. M.
>>> Blaiklock
>>>>>> made the same point in "The Bible and I" p.124 where he
>>>>>> translates John
>>> the
>>>>>> Baptist's "He must increase, I must decrease" as "He must
>>>>>> CONTINUALLY
>>>>>> INCREASE, I must CONTINUALLY DECREASE."
>>>>
>>>> But isn't your friend then guilty of misquoting Dr. Eric Jay?
>>>> The quote specifically mentions two of the subsets of the
>>>> imperfective
>>> aspect:
>>>> 1. Prolonging (continuous)
>>>> 2. Iterative (repeated)
>>>>
>>>> In the case of 1 Cor 14:5, the intended aspect is clearly
>>>> iterative, not
>>> continuous, and that agrees with Dr. Jay's
>>>> general statement.
>>>>
>>>> I mentioned the third one which I called general (I can see from  
>>>> Dave
>>> Smith that others call it customary, unless
>>>> customary is intended to cover both general and iterative, like
>>>> going back
>>> to fishing, not 24/7, but repeatedly. I don't
>>>> have a copy of Dana and Mantey.)
>>>>
>>>> The quote from Blaiklock indicates that we really need to look at
>>>> both
>>> grammatical aspect and lexical aspect. Certain
>>>> lexical items lend themselves naturally to be used with one aspect
>>>> rather
>>> than another. Some words stand for a process
>>>> like "increase", and those are naturally used with an imperfective
>>>> aspect,
>>> at least if the process is in focus. Whether
>>>> the increase is in the form of a gradual slope or individual steps
>>>> doesn't
>>> really matter.  If you study the usage of the
>>>> word AUXANW (grow, increase), you will notice that it normally
>>>> occurs in
>>> the imperfective aspect, either present or
>>>> imperfect "tense". When it is used in the aorist, the focus is  
>>>> on the
>>> growth event as a whole. One helpful way of
>>>> looking at the perfective versus imperfective aspect is to note
>>>> that with
>>> the perfective aspect the event is generally
>>>> looked at from the outside as a whole unit. In the imperfective
>>>> aspect, it
>>> is as if you are standing inside together
>>>> with the actor. Your focus is on the continued, iterative or
>>> timeless/general aspect of the event rather than the
>>>> completed event.
>>>>
>>>> To give a brief comment to Eddie, I am not saying that the aorist
>>>> aspect
>>> is always best explained as a one-time event. I
>>>> said that in the case of this particular verb in the aorist
>>>> infinitive,
>>> that is a reasonable description. I suggest you
>>>> take the time to look up the Greek data yourself.
>>>>
>>>> As the imperfective aspect can be described as normally employing
>>>> one of
>>> the following:
>>>> 1. Continuous aspect
>>>> 2. Iterative aspect
>>>> 3. General aspect (used in general, timeless statements)
>>>>
>>>> so the perfective aspect can be differentiated into:
>>>>
>>>> 1. Non-continuous
>>>> 2. Non-iterative
>>>> 3. Specific
>>>>
>>>> The first two of these (or maybe all three) have traditionally
>>>> been called
>>> punctiliar in Greek grammar, and the
>>>> imperfective durative, but I prefer to use words that are used more
>>> generally in modern descriptive linguistics.
>>>>
>>>> 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/
>>
>>
> ---
> B-Greek home page: http://metalab.unc.edu/bgreek
> B-Greek mailing list
> B-Greek at lists.ibiblio.org
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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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