[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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