[B-Greek] PEPOIHKEN in Heb. 11:28
Elizabeth Kline
kline_dekooning at earthlink.net
Tue Jun 5 14:26:59 EDT 2007
On Jun 5, 2007, at 4:08 AM, Iver Larsen wrote:
> For some verbs the semantic content will allow the perfect to
> indicate a stative aspect, but I don't
> think that applies to POIEW. There are 18 perfect forms of this
> verb in the NT, and none of them can
> reasonably be described as stative. However, the perfect does seem
> to have a ring of finality about
> it. It might be called an "emphatic past". That this event has
> happened cannot be argued against.
>
> For instance, Paul says in 2 Cor 11:25 that he has spent a night
> and day in the deep (ocean):
> NUCQHMERON EN TWi BUQWi PEPOIHKA.
>
> Paul is not in a stative position in the deep, nor is the "day and
> night" in any way stative. He is
> emphasizing that he actually did spend a day and night in the deep
> waters. One might say that he is
> in the position of having had this experience, but IMO that is
> stretching the idea of "stative"
> beyond its normal usage.
Iver,
I agree with you about 2Cor 11:25.
I am not going argue over the stative in PEPOIHKEN in Heb. 11:28. I
was just reporting on Ellingworth, not agreeing with him. Porter's
framework perfective-imperfective-stative is just a general way of
dealing with aspect, exceptions abound (as always).
Zerwick(Roma 1963, #285-291) claims the perfect indicates "not the
past action but the present <<state of affairs>> resulting from the
past action." I suspect (??) this is the sense in which Porter
(Idioms 2nd ed. p.23ff) is using the word stative. Zerwick is aware
of those who read the perfect in the GNT in light of Modern Greek and
he admits that there are places in the GNT where the perfect
**appears** to be used like the aorist but he claims these can be
explained without giving up the distinctive semantics of the perfect
(see Zerwick #289, BDF #343).
In light of this, lets take a look at PEPOIHKEN in 1Jn 5:10
1JOHN 5:10 hO PISTEUWN EIS TON hUION TOU QEOU ECEI THN MARTURIAN EN
hEAUTWi, hO MH PISTEUWN TWi QEWi YEUSTHN PEPOIHKEN AUTON, hOTI OU
PEPISTEUKEN EIS THN MARTURIAN hHN MEMARTURHKEN hO QEOS PERI TOU hUIOU
AUTOU
It seems to me that YEUSTHN PEPOIHKEN AUTON could be understood as
describing a state of affairs resulting from a past action without
inflicting irreparable damage on the "stative" semantic category. I
would read this as one state of affairs MH PISTEUWN TWi QEWi
(presented aspectually as an imperfective) resulting in a second
state of affairs YEUSTHN PEPOIHKEN AUTON (presented aspectually as a
stative). It seems to me that John is presenting MH PISTEUWN TWi QEWi
and YEUSTHN PEPOIHKEN AUTON not as events but as states. However, it
isn't very difficult to see how this statement might be inverted.
Elizabeth Kline
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