[B-Greek] Qualitative Predicate Nominatives
Rolf Furuli
furuli at online.no
Sat Oct 7 01:47:07 EDT 2006
Dear list-members,
> "A general rule about the construction can now be stated: An
> anarthrous pre-verbal PN is normally qualitative, sometimes definite,
> and only rarely indefinite."
Grammatical rules should ideally be falsifyable or at least testable. When
Colewell, Harner, Dixon, and Wallace used the word "qualitative," how could
they identify the concept? On the basis of which criteria or parameters
could the say that "this noun is qualitative and this is indefinite". In
order to explore this, I rephrase the general rule of Walace, and ask those
who believe in the rule to show that the repharising is wrong.
"A general rule about the construction can now be stated: An
anarthrous pre-verbal PN is normally indefinite, sometimes definite. In some
cases where the noun is indefinite it seems that the writer wanted to stress
the qualities or characteristics of the referent rather than his/her/its
mere existence."
Below we find some examples taken from John:
4:19 "a prophet"
6:70 "a slanderer"
8:44 " a murderer"
8:44 "a liar"
9:17 "a prophet"
10:1 "a thief"
10:13 "a hired laborer"
10:33 "man"
12:6 " a thief"
Are the substantives above indefinite, qualitative, or indefinite and
qualitative?
In order to demonstrate that my rephrasing of Wallace´s rule is wrong, you
need to point to a reasonable number of examples where only the quality of
the substantive is stressed (made visible). You should also state on which
basis you decide that a substantive is "qualitative," whether it is your gut
feeling, or whether you use particular linguistic parameters. While we
cannot learn Greek grammar on the basis of English translations, the
renderings of Greek preverbal PNs into English show how the translators
viewed them. Are these generally translated by adjectives (remember that
Wallace´s rule says that such PNs "normally" are qualitative) or as
substantives?
Best regards,
Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo
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