[B-Greek] EILHFEN, Rev. 8:5 -- "aoristic"?
frjsilver at optonline.net
frjsilver at optonline.net
Wed Nov 15 18:44:19 EST 2006
>From a slightly oblique angle, I have to say that I've become convinced that a very high proportion of aorist verbs in the Greek 70 aren't really of that tense at all, but are an attempt to render many Hebrew verbs in a sort of durative or habitual (imperfective) aspect in Greek; I call this phenomenon 'aoristic'.
As such, even though these Hebrew verbs were translated into Greek aorists in The 70 and they've usually been rendered into English by present-perfect forms, I think they might better be represented by simple present-tense forms.
Father James Silver
Monk James
Orthodox Church in America
----- Original Message -----
From: "Carl W. Conrad"
Date: Monday, November 13, 2006 4:16 pm
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] EILHFEN, Rev. 8:5 -- "aoristic"?
To: George F Somsel
Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> I rather think that the aorist and present perfect overlap
> increasingly in usage in the Koine -- I think that many an
> aorist can
> be legitimately Englished as "I have ... /he/she has ... "; it's
>
> possible that influence of Latin usage (the Latin aorist and
> perfect
> merged into the single tense -- perfect-- very early. Certainly
> the
> perfect tense is less common in Koine than it was in earlier periods.
>
> On Nov 13, 2006, at 3:46 PM, George F Somsel wrote:
>
> > Robertson terms this "The 'Aoristic' Present Perfect" on pp
> 898-902
> > of his _A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of
> > Historical Research_. He also references Burton, _Syntax of
> the
> > Moods and Tenses in New Testament Greek_, pp 43-44
> >
> > Still other cases should perhaps be explained as Aoristic
> Perfects,
> > but for the reasons mentioned in 86 it is impossible [Page 44]
> to
> > decide with certainty. While there is clear evidence that the
> > Perfect tense was in the New Testament sometimes an Aorist in
> > force, yet it is to be observed that the New Testament writers
> had
> > perfect command of the distinction between the Aorist and the
> > Perfect. The instances of the Perfect in the sense of the
> Aorist
> > are confined almost entirely to a few forms, ESXHKA, EILHFA,
> > hEWRAKA, EIRHKA, and GEGONA, and the use of each of these
> forms in
> > the sense of an Aorist mainly to one or more writers whose use
> of
> > it is apparently almost a personal idiosyncrasy. Thus the
> aoristic
> > use of GEGONA belongs to Matt.; of EILHFA to John in Rev.; of
> > ESXHKA to Paul; but see also Heb. 7:13. The idiom is therefore
>
> > confined within narrow limits in the New Testament. Cf.
> Ev.Pet. 23,
> > 31.
> >
> > Burton, E. D. W. (1898). Syntax of the moods and tenses in New
>
> > Testament Greek (3rd ed.) (43). Edinburg: T. & T. Clark.
> >
> >
> > george
> > gfsomsel
> > _________
> >
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message ----
> > From: Webb
> > To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> > Sent: Monday, November 13, 2006 2:45:40 PM
> > Subject: [B-Greek] EILHFEN, Rev. 8:5 -- "aoristic"?
> >
> >
> > KAI EILHFEN hO ANGELOS [AGGELOS?] TON LIBANTWNON, KAI
> EGEMISEN
> > AUTON EK TOU
> > PUROS... Rev. 8:5
> >
> >
> >
> > Can someone confirm for me that EILHFEN (perfect) is truly
> > equivalent to
> > ELABEN (aorist) here, as ZG says? If it isn't, what nuance do
> we
> > get from
> > the use of the perfect?
> >
> >
> >
> > Webb Mealy
> >
> > ---
> > B-Greek home page: http://ibiblio.org/bgreek
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> >
> > ---
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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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