[B-Greek] Eph 2:2 and syntactic significance of TOU PNEUMATOS

Brian Abasciano bvabasciano at gmail.com
Fri Feb 16 08:10:00 EST 2007


Iver,

I think you are misunderstanding the way many grammarians use the term 
"genitive of apposition" or
appositive genitive". You seem to be confusing it with the general concept 
of grammatical apposition in which the second appositive must be in the same 
case as the first, refers to the same person or thing, and has the same 
syntacitcal relationship to the rest of the clause. The genitive of 
apposition is a defining or explanatory use of the genitive with a head noun 
of any case. It seems that most (all?) the standard grammars include it. I 
started this discussion partly because Wallace claims that two personal 
nouns cannot exist in this type of explanatory realtionship, and I 
questioned this and wanted to check others' views on it. I think there is 
general agreement that Wallace's claim is incorrect here. You seem to agree 
in substance as well, even if you dislike the commonly used terminology for 
this type of genitive. I generally agree with your asessment, though not 
specifically. I wouldn't see TOU PNEUMATOS as indicating that the leader in 
view is spiritual so much as "the spirit who . . ." This does, as you say, 
give further delineation or qualification to the noun it modifies. But this 
does not mean it must be conceived adjectivally.

God bless!

Brian Abasciano

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Iver Larsen" <iver_larsen at sil.org>
To: "Bryant J. Williams III" <bjwvmw at com-pair.net>; "Brian Abasciano" 
<bvabasciano at gmail.com>; <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 2:57 AM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Eph 2:2 and syntactic significance of TOU PNEUMATOS


> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Bryant J. Williams III" <bjwvmw at com-pair.net>
>
>
>> Dear Brian,
>>
>> If laid out correctly, it appears that it is Genitive of Apposition.
>>
>>    EN hAIS POTE PERIEPATHSATE
>>        KATA TON AIWNA         TOU KOSMOU TOUTOU,
>>        KATA TON ARCONTA  TOU EXOUSIAS TOU AEROS,
>>                                                  TOU PNEUMATOS TOU NUN 
>> ENERGOUNTAS
>>                                                   EN TOIS hUIOIS THS 
>> APEIQEIAS
>                                                    (attributive genitive, 
> ATR, p. 497)
>>
>> BDF, page 92, paragraph 167,  "167. Genitive of content and appositive
>> genitive. ...The use of the appositive genitive, i.e., of the genitive 
>> used
>> in the sense of an appositive, conforms in the NT to classical usage: 2 C
>> 5:5 TON ARRABWNA TOU PNEUMATOS 'the guarantee (earnest) which consists in
>> the spirit.' Cf., K.-G. I 264; Pfister, Festgabe Deissmann (1927) 72f.; 
>> Rob.
>> 498f.
>>
>> A. T. Robertson, Page 498-499, 4. Apposition or Definition gives several
>> examples indicating that it is a well-known idiom in Homer, and that, "as
>> Moulton suggests, the vernacular has preserved the poetical idiom in this 
>> as
>> in so many other matters. Poetry often expresses better than prose the
>> language of the people." I do find it interesting that Robertson does 
>> give
>> Eph 2:14, 20 as examples.
>
> I must admit that I find the term "appositive genitive" both confusing and 
> unnecessary. In BDF it is listed as the last subdivision of the adnominal 
> genitive. In the introduction to the adnominal genitive, BDF says that it 
> normally functions like an adjective as either an attribute or predicate. 
> The term attribute only says that the genitive gives some further 
> qualification or delineation of the noun it modifies. It can be useful to 
> classify how the attributive genitive further describes the noun and the 
> relationship between the noun and the genitive word as e.g. origin, 
> subjective, objective, partitive, quality, direction, purpose and content 
> as long as we realize that this is not derived from any grammatical 
> feature, but from the semantic content of the head noun and the 
> attributive genitive. In order words, it is an exegetical, contextual or 
> pragmatic description rather than a grammatical one.
>
> In the case of Eph 2:2 I cannot see that TOU PNEUMATOS can be in 
> apposition to TON ARCONTA, since I would expect an apposition to TON 
> ARCONTA to be in the accusative. I find it more plausible that both TOU 
> EXOUSIAS and TOU PNEUMATOS are attributes of TON ARCONTA which both 
> further describe the leader. In the NT, ARCWN is usually a human leader, 
> so TOU PNEUMATOS clarifies that this ARCWN is a spiritual leader. The 
> EXOUSIAS describes the leader as one who has power/authority. The TOU 
> AEROS clarifies his domain and location.
>
> I don't see a problem with PNEUMATOS having the sense of "spiritual". 
> Although the word in the GNT often refers to the Holy Spirit and therefore 
> can be said to be personal, there are other cases where the word can 
> hardly be termed personal. PNEUMA has many senses, and in this context, I 
> would go for sense 4 in BAGD (an independent (good or evil) being in 
> contrast to a being that can be perceived by the physical senses). There 
> is an adjective PNEUMATIKOS, but it is almost exclusively used in the 
> positive sense of something related to or coming from the Holy Spirit. The 
> only place where it describes evil spirits is in Eph 6:12 which in many 
> ways is parallel to Eph 2:2.
>
> I would therefore venture the translation (and exegesis) "according to the 
> powerful, (evil-) spiritual ruler in the air who is now working in those 
> who are disobedient (to God)."  Even in English, I am not sure whether 
> "spiritual" can be used to refer to an evil spirituality. My guess is that 
> it is this sense of positive precedence for the meaning of the adjective 
> that made Paul use the other way of stating an attribute, namely the 
> genitive.
>
> I realize it is a difficult construction open to various interpretations, 
> and I certainly disagree with the NET exegesis.
>
> Iver Larsen
> 




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