[B-Greek] Ephesians 1:13

Barry nebarry at verizon.net
Thu Sep 28 06:30:33 EDT 2006


> -----Original Message-----
> From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org]
> On Behalf Of Nick Ashton
> Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 4:27 AM
> To: Revdpickrel at wmconnect.com
> Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Ephesians 1:13
> 
> The Greek word translated "after" in KJV but "when" in some other
> versions is "en" (Strongs 1722)
> 
> Sorry if I have mis-used this site, I just wondered if the greek gives
> further light on the passage not visible from the english.
> I'll look into amending my signature.

Nick, no, this is simply wrong.  What we have is an aorist participle (PISTEUSANTES), literally "having believed" (as, somewhat surprisingly, the NIV literally translates).  The EN governs the relative pronoun hWi... Often the aorist participle is used to express action taking place prior to the action of the verb in its clause, which would be part of the justification of the translating it with the English preposition "after" in the KJV.  I'm not going to comment extensively on the rendering, but I suspect that the KJV translators saw it as parallel to the first clause (AKOUSANTES, "having believed") and saw the action of being sealed with the Spirit as subsequent to their belief, in a grammatical sense.  Of course, it doesn't have to be read this way.  "Having answered, he said..."  Are these two sequential actions?

N.E. Barry Hofstetter 
Adjunct Faculty & IT Support 
The Center for Urban Theological Studies 
http://www.cuts.edu 
Classics Instructor, The American Academy 
http://www.theamericanacademy.net 
And my site: 
http://mysite.verizon.net/nebarry 
 

 




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