[B-Greek] Hebrews 1:1-2 EN

Elizabeth Kline kline_dekooning at earthlink.net
Tue Dec 18 16:34:09 EST 2007


On Dec 17, 2007, at 10:29 PM, George F Somsel wrote:
> Consider the case of Mt 2.1
>
> Τοῦ δὲ Ἰησοῦ γεννηθέντος ἐν  
> Βηθλέεμ τῆς Ἰουδαίας ἐν ἡμέραις  
> Ἡρῴδου τοῦ βασιλέως
>
> TOU DE IHSOU GENNHQENTOS EN BHQLEEM THS IOUDAIAS EN hHMERAIS  
> hHRWiDOU TOU BASILEWS
>
> Here we have the same preposition repeated as in Heb 1.1-2 about  
> which you ask.  Would you understand the first EN in the same  
> manner as the second?
>
>
> george
> gfsomsel

Agreed.


Jim Alderman wrote:

> With both occurrences of EN being in the same sentence, both with the
> dative, both following the same verb root and hence resulting in  
> such a
> parallel construction ...


HEB. 1:1 POLUMERWS KAI POLUTROPWS PALAI hO QEOS LALHSAS TOIS PATRASIN  
EN TOIS PROFHTAIS  2 EP' ESCATOU TWN hHMERWN TOUTWN ELALHSEN hHMIN EN  
hUIWi, hON EQHKEN KLHRONOMON PANTWN, DI' hOU KAI EPOIHSEN TOUS AIWNAS:

Parallelism in both the Heb. Bible and the GNT is an exceedingly  
complex phenomenon demonstrating a diverse variety of semantic  
patterns. The parallel constituents may contain almost any  
combination of similar and contrastive terms. In Hebrews 1:1-2 we  
have one similar term  hO QEOS LALHSAS ... [hO QEOS] ELALHSEN. There  
is a temporal contrast PALAI ... EP' ESCATOU TWN hHMERWN TOUTWN, a  
contrast between TOIS PATRASIN ... hHMIN, and a contrast between EN  
TOIS PROFHTAIS and EN hUIWi. It might be argued that the plural  
datives TOIS PATRASIN ... hHMIN have the same semantic function; the  
semantic value of the datives being constrained by the verb LALHSAS/ 
ELALHSEN. But the EN + dative (personal) used with the arguments TOIS  
PROFHTAIS and hUIWi presents us with different situation. The  
referent of one of these terms hUIWi is, throughout the book of  
Hebrews, represented in a series of contrastive relationships where  
the difference between the contrastive terms is the main point of the  
argument. That combined with the well known semantic flexibility of  
EN + dative should give us a reason to pause before hammering these  
two expressions into an identical semantic mold.

OFF TOPIC:

Contemplating the potential significance of the expression hO  
QEOS ... ELALHSEN hHMIN EN hUIWi, I seem to recall K.Barth wrote  
about a million words on this topic. None of which is to be discussed  
in this forum.


Elizabeth Kline







More information about the B-Greek mailing list