[B-Greek] oblique case as subject of infinitive

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Jul 27 05:54:01 EDT 2007


On Jul 26, 2007, at 11:30 PM, Delbert Flora wrote:

> Would these examples count toward oblique cases functioning as  
> 'subject' of
> an infinitive? Wallace lists the following two (and John 4:7  
> mention in my
> last post). Jude looks like the dative TWi DUNAMENWi is subject,  
> but I'm not
> sure about EMOI in Phil 1:7. (Wallace also list Phil 1:29)
>
>
> Jude 24
>
> TWi DE DUNAMENWi FULAXAI hUMAS APTAISTOUS KAI STHSAI KATENWPION THS  
> DOXHS
> AUTOU AMWMOUS EN AGALLIASEI ...

FULAXAI here is a complementary infinitive to DUNAMENWi; TWi  
DUNAMENWi is a substantival participle ultimately clarified by its  
appositive MONWi QEWi SWTHRI hHMWN in verse 25: "to the one who can  
preserve you ... , who alone is God our savior. Here the substantive  
participle indicates a person and describes that person in terms of  
the action of the participle. It is the case here however that the  
actual subject of the infinitive is indicated by the dative case.

>
> Phil 1:7
>
> KAQWS ESTIN DIKAION EMOI TOUTO FRONEIN hUPER PANTWN hUMWN...

Here the infinitive phrase TOUTO FRONEIN hUPER PANTWN hUMWN is itself  
the subject of DIKAION ESTIN EMOI. And it is the case here too that  
the dative pronoun EMOI indicates who "assumes this attitude on  
behalf of you all."

So the case that the subject of the infinitive is indicated in these  
instances by a substantive and by a pronoun  in the dative case  
rather than a nominative, but it seems to me a bit misleading to use  
the term "subject of the infinitive" for TWi DUNAMENWi and EMOI in  
view of their syntactic function in these clauses.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad2 at mac.com
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/





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