[B-Greek] On voice
John Sanders
jfs at jfsanders.com
Wed May 23 09:42:53 EDT 2007
Delbert,
I am sure others will provide you with very useful views on “voice,” but let me provide you with one more view that may be a wee bit different.
First, let me begin with what we know. I will provide an example of a sentence in English using the “active voice” and the same sentence in the “passive voice”.
Joe hit me. (Active voice)
I was hit by Joe. (Passive voice)
If we look at the verb, hit, in the passive sentence, we see that the verb is in the “active voice” form. There is no “passive” form for any verb in English, the passive voice is a construction employing a verb in the active voice preceded by a form of the verb “to be”.
One main function of the verb “to be” is to set up a “state of existence”: That is a rock; this is Linda; that is one big ape! There is no energy here, it is just a “photograph”. And that is what the passive voice in English is, for the above example, I am in a state where Joe hit me. There is no change of state taking place (when energy is present, a change of state is taking place, when Joe hit me, be beginning state I am smiling, in the change of state, Joe’s fist is in my face, in the new state, there is blood all over my face), just a photo of a state (that state may show Joe’s fist in my face, but no change is taking place). The “passive voice” is truly passive (pun intended).
Now let us go to the Greek, but I will still use English to demonstrate my thoughts. So, I will capriciously, arbitrarily, by fiat declare that if I add the suffix “to” to any active verb, it is now in “middle form”. So, we now have:
I hitto by Joe. (middle voice)
There is now energy moving, it is coming from Joe (we can see that in the construction of the sentence) to me; before I was smiling, now my face is all bloody. I can feel that energy.
There is a wrinkle here, though. I can also write:
I hitto Joe. (middle voice)
The energy is now moving from me to Joe. So what is the difference between this form and the “active voice”? Before we go on, we should remember that that English does not employ a “middle form”, nor does Chinese for that matter. Languages can work very well without the use of a “middle form”, but the ancient Indo-Europeans, and some of their descendents, of which the Latin speaking and Greek speaking people are in that class, did employ this form, they did encode certain information that they thought was important into their language.
The “active voice” is the plain form, the simple statement without any emphasis or involvement-it is what we may hear on a TV news program, “an unidentified intruder hacked a family of three to death yesterday, and now for the weather....” But when I, myself was the recipient of that hitting by Joe, when that hitting was deliberate (when I, myself deliberately hit Joe, and that hitting had perhaps more zest and punch in it, then one will use the “middle voice”.
Let us go to the Greek. We are sitting in a tent with Achilles. Man, is he complaining about about that thug who took his prize. Wait, do you hear that commotion outside. Is that ANTILOXUS shouting, his voice an octave higher than normal, as if in shock. What is that, KEITAI PATROKLOS? Patroklos (I forget how to write his name in english now, I apologize) is not just lying there, it is Patroklos himself, that is lying there; and his lying there in the dust, as if he could be a feast for dogs and vultures, is (or was) deliberate. It was even done with energy. And just think, a week before Patroklos KEITAI a line in the sand, demonstrating some theorem in geometry. Well, maybe it was not Patroklos, it was Euclid a millennium later. With Homer, you can get the full melodrama in that protasis that Antilochus hurled at Achilles. In Euclid, when he KEITAI a line between A and B, there is no drama, but the line was put there deliberately and Euclid himself put it there.
To sum up, if you want to just put out a plain form of speech, then use the “active voice” (although idiom may require one voice or another in any particular instance); if the OUSIASTIKON, the essence (or substantive) of the sentence-that is when a nomen, an ONOMA, a noun, is put into a PROTASIS, a sentence, is itself involved, or if the verb that makes it essential is deliberately employed, or there is more vigor and energy employed, anything that makes us want to stand the verb out from just being plain, then a “middle voice” is used. If the energy is moving toward the subject (or topic, or focus, whatever you want to call it), then a “middle voice” is required, and appropriate signals will be used. If the energy is moving from the subject outwards, then, if the forms are available, one can use either an “active voice” or a “middle voice”.
I apologize for the length.
John Sanders
Suzhou, China
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