[B-Greek] Anarthrous vs Arthrous Genitive in II Corinthians 3:6 & 3:14

Elizabeth Kline kline_dekooning at earthlink.net
Fri Jul 24 14:34:01 EDT 2009


On Jul 23, 2009, at 2:18 PM, Bryant J. Williams III wrote:

> 3:6]
> hOS KAI hIKANWSEN hMAS DIAKONOUS KAINHS DIAQHKHS, OU GRAMMATOS ALLA  
> PNEUMATOS; TO GAR GRAMMA APOKTENNEI, TO DE ZWiOPOIEI.
>
> [3:14]
> ALLA EPWRWQH TA NOHMATA AUTWN. AXRI GAR THS SHMERON hMERAS TO AUTHO  
> KALUMMA EPI THi ANAGNWSEI THS PALAIAS DIAQHKHS MENEI MH  
> ANAKALUPTOMENON, hOTI EN XRISTWi KATARGEITAI.
>
> How would the anarthrous genitive, DIAQHKHS be used here? Is it an  
> Objective Genitive or Descriptive Genitive especially since THS  
> PALAIAS DIAQHKH is used in 3:14?


My first impression looking over the context of 2cor 3:6 was that  
here, unlike many other places in 2Cor, Paul's syntax is straight  
forward so what is there to talk about? In an effort to understand the  
point of your question I took a look at the older greek text  
commentaries which often discuss matters of this sort.  J.Bernard and  
H.Alford address anarthrous DIAQHKHS as a translation issue (a new  
covenant?). Meyer suggests that the anarthrous genitive is  
qualitative. M.J. Harris (2005) p. 270 n. 22 claims KAINHS DIAQHKHS is  
an objective genitive but then says it doesn't make any difference.

Here we have a relatively lucid sample of Pauline discourse. Applying  
the traditional framework (subjective, objective). in my opinion,  
makes trouble for us, makes the text more difficult to understand.  
Having to construct a hypothetical deep structure clause for the  
genitive to see if it is subject or object seems like a lot of work  
when the  KAINHS DIAQHKHS very obviously tells us something important  
about DIAKONOUS. I guess Harris, who is steeped in the traditional  
framework and is also a careful exegete, chose to demote the issue to  
a footnote, to satisfy those who would expect some discussion of this  
while at the same time admits that it has little exegetical  
significance.



Elizabeth Kline







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