[B-Greek] DIA phrase with an infinitive

Ian W. Scott iscott at tyndale.ca
Thu Jun 18 10:03:19 EDT 2009


I'm working on a passage in the Letter of Aristeas and am trying to 
clarify the sense of a prepositional phrase. The clause is an infinitive 
clause: [(H NOMOQESIA] DIA QEOU GEGONENAI. Ordinarily I wouldn't take 
QEOU here as the agent directly responsible for the legislation's 
appearance, since GEGONENAI is a middle/deponent and not a true passive. 
I would assume that DIA QEOU is indicating a less specific relationship 
between God's action and the legislation. "The legislation appeared 
because of God" or something like that (in context it doesn't make sense 
for QEOU to be the intermediate agent). What I'm wondering, though, is 
whether I'm missing an idiom here. What matters to me, exegetically, is 
whether this is a straightforward statement that God directly authored 
the legislation.  I don't think it is. I think it's more vague than 
that. But I'm looking for some second opinions. Any thoughts?


Ian

-- 

Ian W. Scott

Assistant Professor of New Testament

Tyndale Seminary

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

iscott at tyndale.ca <mailto:iscott at tyndale.ca>

http://www.ian-w-scott.com

===================================================

/Paul's Way of Knowing: Story, Experience and the Spirit /(WUNT II.206; 
Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008). 
<http://www.tyndale.ca/%7Eiscott/blog/essays-and-articles/>

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/The Online Critical Pseudepigrapha/ (Atlanta: SBL, 2006-). Online: 
http://www.purl.org/net/ocp




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