[B-Greek] Fwd: Question about John 10:18

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Fri Feb 1 19:40:21 EST 2008


On Feb 1, 2008, at 6:08 PM, Oun Kwon wrote:

> If I understand the text,
>
> TAUTHN THN ENPOLHN ELABON PARA TOU PATROS MOU
                           ENTOLHN
>
>
> as 'This [is] the command [that] I received from my father',
>
> am I misunderstanding the Greek?

You are if you think you have literally rendered the Greek text; on  
the other hand, I think you have rendered the content and rhetorical  
force of the word-order of the Greek. An alternative would be, " I  
received the commandment from my father -- which one? THIS one."

> Then, how would it be phrased in Gk for different English sentences  
> with different nuance and focus, such as

I think the text of John 10:18 could be conveyed with any one of the  
formulations you suggest for the English below. On the other hand,  
each could also be expressed somewhat differently:


>   This command — that's what I received from my Father.
>   It is this command that I received from my Father.
>   This is the command that I received from my Father.

You might play around with the Greek to get the following equivalents:
(a) hAUTH hH ENTOLH (hHN hUMIN ENTELLOMAI), TAUTHN ELABON PARA TOU  
PATROS MOU.
(b) hAUTH hH ENTOLH ESTIN hHN ELABON PARA TOU PATROS MOU.
(c) hAUTH ESTIN hH ENTOLH hHN ELABON PARA TOU PATROS MOU.

In my opinion, (a) is awkward and improbable as anything a Greek  
speaker/writer would have composed, but it is, I think, intelligible.  
I think that (b) and (c) have pretty much the same meaning, but I  
think that (c) is more common Greek.

I think if you had seen Iver's earlier response in this thread you  
might not have posed the questions you have raised here. I think that  
Iver has covered the nauances of the alternative formulations actually  
found in the GNT pretty well.

> On Feb 1, 2008 7:40 AM, Susan Jeffers <susan at read-the-bible.org>  
> wrote:
>> oops. I meant to send this as plain text.  sorry if it duplicates.
>>
>> Hi Matthew
>>
>> I recommend using both the NIV and the NRSV to check your work  
>> against
>> the Mounce answer key.  NRSV tends to be a little closer to the Greek
>> most of the time, but they're both very worthwhile for getting a  
>> sense
>> of the meaning in Greek.  And they help explain why the answer key is
>> what it is, sometimes, when the snippet in the exercise is very short
>> and out-of-context.
>>
>> For John 10:18
>> NIV This command I received from my Father
>> NRSV I have received this command from my Father
>>
>> Tomato, tomato indeed.
>>
>
> <clipped>
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Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)






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