[B-Greek] Genitive of Subordination and Revelation 1:5

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Fri Mar 27 21:15:07 EDT 2009


On Mar 27, 2009, at 8:18 PM, Edgar Foster wrote:

>
> Greetings B-Greekers,
>
> Text for Revelation 1:5: καὶ ἀπὸ Ἰησοῦ  
> Χριστοῦ ὁ μάρτυς ὁ πιστός ὁ  
> πρωτότοκος τῶν νεκρῶν καὶ ὁ ἄρχων  
> τῶν βασιλέων τῆς γῆς τῷ ἀγαπῶντι  
> ἡμᾶς καὶ λύσαντι ἡμᾶς ἐκ τῶν  
> ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν ἐν τῷ αἵματι αὐτοῦ  
> [KAI APO IHSOU XRISTOU hO MARTUS hO PISTOS hO PRWTOTOKOS TWN NEKRWN  
> KAI hO ARXWN TWN BASILEWN THS GHS TWi AGAPWNTI hHMAS KAI LUSANTI  
> hHMAS EK TWN hAMARTIWN hHMWN EN TWi hAIMATI AUTOU].
>
> My question regards how the genitive hO PRWTOTOKOS TWN NEKRWN in  
> this verse might be understood. Is it partitive of a genitive of  
> subordination? Whether this grammatical construction is the former  
> or the latter, another question that has occupied my thinking here  
> lately is whether the so-called "genitive of subordination" is an  
> example of a category that exemplifies the famed unnecessarily  
> multiplied entities which Occam's Law militates against. I ask  
> because of what Daniel B. Wallace (Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics,  
> pp. 103-104) writes about the genitive of subordination in his work.
>
> Wallace writes that the genitive of subordination "is a subset of  
> the objective genitive, but not always." Hence, "For this reason,  
> most likely, such a category is not to be found in standard grammars."
>
> I have looked in other grammars to see what they might say about the  
> genitive of subordination. I did not find a mention of this category  
> in Robertson, nor in William D. Chamberlain's An Exegetical Grammar  
> of the Greek New Testament. I also do not think that the category  
> appears in Brooks and Winbery's Syntax of New Testament Greek, or in  
> Biblical Greek by M. Zerwick or BDF. Cf. Richard A. Young,  
> Intermediate New Testament Greek: A Linguistic and Exegetical  
> Approach.
>
> I guess an additional question is when did grammarians begin to call  
> certain genitive constructs "genitives of subordination"?

For my part, I think I would understand the genitive TWN NEKRWN in  
this context as partitive: of those who have died, the first to come  
to birth again is Jesus Christ.

As for the "genitive of subordination," it appears to be the  
brainchild of Professor Wallace, perhaps "the firstborn of many  
aporetic case-usages." On a more serious note: From the pages you cite  
it would appear that he is concerned with the usage of the genitive to  
indicate those governed by or commanded by one in a position of  
authority, an ARCWN. My guess is that this is really an instance of a  
genitive of comparison -- which is really a genitive of separation  
(ablatival) used especially with comparative adjectives such as  
KREITTWN; although ARCWN is a substantive participle, the verb ARCW  
really means "have priority over" or "be in front." It is certainly  
the case that verbs of command take a genitive object, and I suspect  
that the category of "genitive of subordination" was created, like  
some of those Aristotelian terms for virtues and vices of which he  
says, "We know what the behavior is and can describe it even though we  
have no word for it." I think that Professor Wallace has created a  
name for a genitive usage with an expression of governance or command  
that has always been there but has hitherto been nameless.

BUT: I really do NOT think the phrase PRWTOTOKOS TWN NEKRWN has a  
sense of governance or command over the dead. That sounds more like  
Milton's Satan: "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven."

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)






More information about the B-Greek mailing list