[B-Greek] On Thayer and BDAG

Mark Lightman lightmanmark at yahoo.com
Sat Jul 19 22:39:56 EDT 2008


Mike wrote:
 > Can anyone show me one clear thing wrong in Thayer that BDAG corrects?EKSISThe gloss "habit" goes back to the Vulgate which ironically was semantically correct at time time, but was interpreted incorrectly later on.BDAG is correct because Lee wrote an article on the lexical history of the word and it convinced Danker.
 
hEXIS is a interesting example because Lee does makes a
strong argument that in Heb 5:14 this means something
closer to “condition” or “mature state” than “habit”
or “practice,” which, as Lee notes, most of the versions
go with.  But Thayer does NOT gloss hEXIS as 
“habit,” but instead writes:  “a habit, whether of body
or mind; a power acquired by custom, practice, use.”
This latter definition, recognizing that hEXIS can
be the practice of something or the state attained from
that practice, seems to me to anticipate exactly what
Lee says.  And compare Thayer and BDAG here; 
Thayer actually cites and gives examples in Greek of
MORE passages than BDAG does.  The entry in BDAG
focuses solely on proving the point that hEXIS means
“state of maturity”, which I guess is okay if it does mean
that, but Thayer gives a more balanced treatment.
 
Carl (TECNH) and James (PNRA) gave examples where
BDAG is better overall.  I’ll give some examples, in addition to
hEXIS, where I think Thayer is better.  For STAMNOS,
Thayer tells you it is from hISTHMI (this is particularly
important because I did not know that) he gives you
the Hebrew, and he refers you to the KATASTAMNIZEIN
part of the wine making process.  BDAG gives none of
these details and has nothing not already found in Thayer.
Or, take a look at METEWPIZOMAI, where Thayer’s
treatment is longer and more detailed.  In general, Thayer
is much more likely to refer you to the root and give the
Hebrew.  Carl is right that there is more in Bauer to study
than in Thayer; BDAG gives some great passages written
out in Greek, but Thayer does this too quite often.  Thayer includes
more historical information in entries like Pharisee and Pilate.
He has some neat appendixes which give words unique to 
NT writers and full parsing info on rare verb forms. 
I don’t object to saying that BDAG is a better lexicon than
Thayer.  What I object to is what I have read many times,
even on this list, statements like “Shortly after it was 
published, the discovery of the papyri made Thayer
obsolete.”  This is sort of like, not a lot like, but sort of
like, saying we should not read Hamlet any more because
Shakespeare did not have access to satellite photographs of
Denmark.  Anyway, I think we have reached a consensus, and
have reduced the Thayer bashing and idolatry of BDAG to a
more nuanced level.
 
And as for George’s statement 
 You might consider that no one finds it particularly worth the effort to take precious time to argue the matter with someone who is determined to maintain a particular position.  If you wish to be stubborn, that is your prerogative.  You won't get much support from the academic community. 
The helpful responses I got from Carl, Mike, James, John et al suggest that maybe 
George underestimates how supportive the academic community can be even
towards a stubborn, argumentative sinner like myself.  I would only remind
everyone of what Barry Goldwater said to his Classics teacher:  “Moderation in
discussing lexicons is no virtue, and stubbornness in defense of Thayer is no
vice.” 
 
Mark L. 


      


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