[B-Greek] PASA GRAGH QEOPNEUSTOS KAI WFELIMOS--2 Timothy 3:16

Leonard Jayawardena leonardj at live.com
Fri Jul 24 05:25:13 EDT 2009




In his "Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties," Gleason L. Archer writes, under the entry "2 Timothy," as follows:

Quote


So far as I am aware, no twentieth century English translation has followed RV and ASV in rendering [QEOPNEUSTOS] as an attributive adjective, whether their translators were liberal or conservative in their theological outlook. The reason for this is that no other instance can be found in New Testament Greek where an attributive adjective is connected with a predicate adjective by means of a [KAI] ("and"). The verb "to be" is omitted in this clause; therefore it must be supplied either before or after [QEOPNEUSTOS]. But since [QEOPNEUSTOS] is followed by [KAI] and a second adjective, [WFELIMOS],which everyone agrees is predicate, it necessarily follows that [QEOPNEUSTOS] also is predicate. Hence the only legitimate translation is "All Scripture [ or 'Every Scripture'] (is) God-breathed and profitable..."

Unquote


Is is it a valid argument to say that translation "X" is not legitimate because such a structure is not found in New Testament Greek? With my limited knowledge of Greek, it seems more grammatically regular to translate the words hWSTE KYRIOS ESTIN hO YIOS TOU ANQRWPOU KAI TOU SABBATOU in Mark 2:28 as "so that the son of man and of the sabbath is Lord" rather than as "so that the son of man is Lord also (or even) of the sabbath," as they are always rendered in NT translations, but the latter translation is required (a) by comparison with the parallels in Mt. 12:8 and Lk. 6:5 (though a variant reading has the same wording as Mark 2:28); and (b) because the former translation makes no sense. But if these Greek words stood alone and you had never come across the phrase "son of man" before, how many of you would translate them as "so that the son of man is Lord even of the sabbath"? Note that the two genitives of Mk. 2:28, which are joined by KAI, are separated, with the first modifying the subject and the second becoming a part of the predicate. A similar separation happens to QEOPNEUSTOS KAI WFELIMOS when the former is rendered attributively. 

Is there a parallel to Mark 2:28 elsewhere in NT Greek or is it unique? If latter, wouldn't that vitiate Archer's argument that QEOPNEUSTOS should not be rendered attributively because "no other instance can be found in New Testament Greek where an attributive adjective is connected with a predicate adjective by means of a [KAI]..."?

I would much appreciate readers' comments on both Archer's objections to an attributive translation of QEOPNEUSTOS and my critique of them. Also,is anyone aware of an even better example to counter Archer's argument than my example from Mk. 2:28?
 

Leonard Jayawardena
Sri Lanka
 
P.S. In a private correspondence quite sometime ago, a member of this forum raised a similar objection to my translation of 2 Timothy 3:16, which incidentally is "Every God-breathed writing is also profitable, etc.," and this post will serve also as a response to that (if he still reads this forum).
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