[B-Greek] emoi mathetai (Jn 13,35)
Samuel Sais
samuel at sais-cat.net
Sat Nov 28 07:42:47 EST 2009
I think that, being the Genitive a case that indicates "procedence", the
possessive is a thing that gets atached to, so, belongs to; and the Dative,
being more passive, can indicate "interest": "disciples to/for me. Of
course, in english (in my case, spanish/catalan) both constructions are
rendered with the possessive adjective.
Another question is that I'd prefer translating "I have you as disciples"
because the subject that becomes the object is not "mathetai" but "umeis"
implicit in the person of the verb. Isn't it?
And, of course, many thanks for the comments.
Samuel Sais
Barcelona
----- Original Message -----
From: "Cornell Machiavelli" <cornellmachiavelli at yahoo.com>
To: "Biblical Greek" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Saturday, November 28, 2009 12:27 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] emoi mathetai (Jn 13,35)
What is the semantic difference, in Greek, between the adjective and pronoun
in the examples below? What does a first century Greek reader get from these
two clauses that a 21st century English reader misses?
1. EMOI MAQHTAI ESTE (you are my disciples)
2. MAQHTAI MOU ESTE (you are my disciples)
As an after-thought, could "my" in the English translation -- you are my
disciples -- function here as an adjective and elsewhere as a pronoun?
Sincerely,
C. Q. Machiavelli
________________________________
From: Iver Larsen <iver_larsen at sil.org>
To: Carl W. Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com>; Samuel Sais <samuel at sais-cat.net>
Cc: Biblical Greek <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thu, November 26, 2009 11:28:10 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] emoi mathetai (Jn 13,35)
Let me just add a couple of reasons for agreeing with Carl:
1. John is particularly fond of using the adjective EMOS. Of the 76
instances in
the whole of the NT, 41 are in John's gospel.
2. Although MOI ESTIN can indicate possession and be equivalent to "I have",
it
doesn't fit the context of Jhn 13:35 to suggest that hOTI EMOI MAQHTAI ESTE
could mean "I have disciples" or the more literal "you are to me disciples".
All
translations seem to interpret it as an adjective: "my disciples".
3. That EMOI precedes MAQHTAI gives a certain contrastive prominence to "MY
disciples". Rabbis in those days had disciples, but Jesus' disciples were to
be
different from all others and recognizable by their mutual love - rather
than
selfish ambitions and heated arguments. The same phrase occurs in John 15:8.
The
unemphatic order occurs with the genitive pronoun rather than the dative in
John
8:31: ALHQWS MAQHTAI MOU ESTE.
4. The adjective reading is grammatically and semantically simple and
straightforward, while the pronoun is a bit awkward. The simplest reading is
usually to be preferred.
Iver Larsen
----- Original Message -----
From: "Carl W. Conrad" <cwconrad2 at mac.com>
To: "Samuel Sais" <samuel at sais-cat.net>
Cc: "Biblical Greek" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: 26. november 2009 18:15
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] emoi mathetai (Jn 13,35)
> For what it's worth, I too am inclined to think that EMOI in this instance
> is
> a the possessive pronominal adjective. Of course, the form is spelled
> identically with the dative sg. of EGW.
>
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (ret)
>
>
> On Thursday, November 26, 2009, at 06:22AM, "Samuel Sais"
> <samuel at sais-cat.net> wrote:
>>Dear b-greekers,
>>in John 13,35 we read "emoì mathetaí este" that is analised like a Dative
>>Possessive construction by Zerwick - Grosvenor. But I wonder why "emoí"
>>cannot
>>be a Nominative Plural Masculine of the possessive pronoun
>>"emós, -é, -ón"?
>>Can anyone shed light on it?
>>Thank you
>>Samuel Sais
>>Barcelona
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