[B-Greek] PNEUMATI THEOU: Meaning of Genitive
Deborah Millier
deborahmillier at yahoo.com
Tue Apr 17 21:38:11 EDT 2007
Hi B-Greek Listers!
Jerry Reimer wrote:
> It is the expositor/exegete's decision
> as to what the function of the genitive
> case is in any given context. Thus,
> eventually, it is largely if not entirely
> a subjective matter and the theological
> agenda of the translator will generally
> come through.
Hi Jerry. Your comments only speak to the matter of
distinguishing between, say, a genitive of possession
and/or a genitive of origin. Etc. I disagree that even
that is a primarily subjective matter, although I
agree that subjectivity may come into play in
especially nuanced distinctions.
However, as far as the logic of language is concerned,
it is safe to say that ALL genitives AUTOMATICALLY
distinguish between one thing and
another(s), or else there would be no point of
reference/comparison. All genitives basically fall
into this formula: Y of X. Therefore Y is in
relationship to X and cannot logically be exactly the
same thing.
Do you see the point now?
George Somsel wrote:
> If one maintains that the Spirit here
> must be distinct from God, how
> then would he understand 1 Cor 2.11
>
> TIS GAR OIDEN ANQRWPWN TA TOU ANQRWPOU
> EI MN TO PNEUMA TOU ANQRWPOU TO EN AUTWi
Hi George. I am pretty sure from your past postings
that you believe that the Bible generally purports
some sort of distinction between the Spirit and God
(hence "PNEUMATI THEOU"). In other words PNEUMATI
THEOU does not mean "The Spirit Who is It/Himself
God."
What you may have [mis]understood from Laurence's
initial post on this thread is that the other party in
his dialog (me) was claiming that the Spirit is not
Deity or organically related to God-proper. That is
not at all my claim. Actually, in Laurence's and my
dialog, I am claiming some sort of a distinction as in
the form of a subdivision of..., a component of...,
that which is possessed by..., etc. (Typical genitive
stuff.) But not two completly different entities
without organic relation to each other. This is a
linguistic matter more than a theological one.
So, going back to your (George's) illustration of a
person's hand and the person, one could say that the
hand is a component of the person. But if the hand
were removed, the person would not cease to exist.
Therefore, the hand (Y) is in relationship to the
person (X), but not exactly the person. It is the hand
*of* the person, the Y *of* the X, that is in view.
Would you agree in essence with that formulation,
George?
Shalom from Manila,
--Michael Millier
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list