[B-Greek] Eph 6:17 hO and gender agreement

Iver Larsen iver_larsen at sil.org
Mon Feb 5 02:37:49 EST 2007


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "George F Somsel" <gfsomsel at yahoo.com>
To: "Iver Larsen" <iver_larsen at sil.org>; "Oun Kwon" <kwonbbl at gmail.com>; "B-Greek" 
<b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, February 04, 2007 5:57 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Eph 6:17 hO and gender agreement


Of course, in Re 5.6 the reason that hOI is used is not because PNEUMATA is considered to be 
personal but rather because OFQALMOS is a masc noun and the article is in agreement therewith.
-----------------------------

Iver:

I did not intend to go into a discussion of English grammar, but since you are doing so, I need to 
comment a bit. Yes, hOI in this verse is masculine because it refers back to its antecedent 
OFQALMOUS, and it is not attracted to the neuter of PNEUMATA. English has a peculiar distinction 
between "who" and "which", which/that is irrelevant for Greek and most other languages, including my 
lanugage, Danish. It has nothing whatsoever to do with gender, such as masculine or neuter. Since 
English requires that distinction, the translator has to make an interpretive decision, and the 
standard is to use "which" in Rev 5:6, because a reference to "eyes" as non-personal would suggest 
it. The translation used in Exegetical Summaries says "that are", which is also an option in 
English. When to use who, which or that in English is a rather muddy issue and varies with time. I 
am sure you remember the statement: Our Father which art in Heaven.


George:
Likewise, Carl was correct in stating that hO is the result of attraction to hRHMA.  It has nothing 
to do with whether it is an abstract concept.
george
gfsomsel
_________

Iver:

You are misrepresenting what Carl stated. He gave two options, not one.

We were talking about the fixed phrase hO ESTIN. So, let me repeat the examples I gave, so you can 
have another chance of looking at them:

Mrk 12:42 EBALEN LEPTA DUO, hO ESTIN KODRANTHS (that is)
Mrk 15:16 APHGAGON AUTON ESW THS AULHS, hO ESTIN PRAITWRION (that is)
Mrk 15:42 HN PARASKEUH, hO ESTIN PROSABBATON (that is)
Eph 5:5 H PLEONEKTHS, hO ESTIN EIDWLOLATRHS (that is)
Col 1:24 hUPER TOU SWMATOS AUTOU, hO ESTIN hH EKKLHSIA (that is)

Notice how the hO as part of "hO ESTIN" is neither attracted to the following noun, nor does it 
agree with an antecedent noun, but rather with an antecedent concept or phrase.
That is why I prefer to go with Carl's first option rather than the second as he stated it: "In my 
view the hO\ as neuter relative either (a) refers to the whole idea of THN MACAIRAN TOU PNEUMATOS or 
(b)..."

Iver Larsen




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