[B-Greek] PRIN before the birth of Abraham/the Muses.
Carl Conrad
cwconrad2 at mac.com
Thu Oct 15 06:10:33 EDT 2009
On Oct 14, 2009, at 9:48 PM, Steven Cox wrote:
>
> Carl
> Sorry. Yes I should have transliterated the Perseus transliterations
> into BGreek and provided context of complete sentences.
> Discourteous. My apologies.
>
>
> But, thank you for the time spent on such a complete and helpful
> answer. Can I further ask:
>
>> PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI points to a moment of time when Abraham was
>> born, while PRIN ABRAAM GEGONENAI points to a time span prior to
>> Abraham's existence.<
>
> Is that because time in the clause PRIN...GENESQAI is in itself
> ambiguous, and in other contexts it could mean "before this (future)
> happens", wheras GEGONENAI being "before" + perfective, is in effect
> equivalent to a pluperfect "before this had happened"?
>
> PRIN TI GENESQAI, TOUTO PRASSW before sth. happens/happened I do
> this.
> PRIN TI GENESQAI, TOUTO PRAXW before sth. will happen, I will do
> this.
>
> PRIN TI GENESQAI, TOUTO EPRAXA before that happened, I did this.
>
> cf. PRIN TI GEGONENAI, TOUTO PEPRAXA before sth. had happened, I had
> done this.
That's right, except it should be noted that PRIN can take other
constructions, e.g. with AN + subjunctive or optative, as preposition
with a genitive. There are 13 instances in the GNT of PRIN in all:
πρίν before; formerly (13)
Matt. 1:18 τῷ Ἰωσήφ, πρὶν ἢ συνελθεῖν
αὐτοὺς
Matt. 26:34 ταύτῃ τῇ νυκτὶ πρὶν
ἀλέκτορα φωνῆσαι τρὶς
Matt. 26:75 Ἰησοῦ εἰρηκότος ὅτι πρὶν
ἀλέκτορα φωνῆσαι τρὶς
Mark 14:30 ταύτῃ τῇ νυκτὶ πρὶν ἢ δὶς
ἀλέκτορα
Mark 14:72 ὁ Ἰησοῦς ὅτι πρὶν ἀλέκτορα
φωνῆσαι δὶς
Luke 2:26 μὴ ἰδεῖν θάνατον πρὶν [ἢ]
Luke 22:61 εἶπεν αὐτῷ ὅτι πρὶν
ἀλέκτορα φωνῆσαι σήμερον
John 4:49 κύριε, κατάβηθι πρὶν
ἀποθανεῖν τὸ παιδίον
John 8:58 λέγω ὑμῖν, πρὶν Ἀβραὰμ
γενέσθαι ἐγὼ
John 14:29 νῦν εἴρηκα ὑμῖν πρὶν
γενέσθαι, ἵνα
Acts 2:20 αἷμα, πρὶν ἐλθεῖν ἡμέραν
κυρίου
Acts 7:2 ἐν τῇ Μεσοποταμίᾳ πρὶν ἢ
κατοικῆσαι αὐτὸν
Acts 25:16 χαρίζεσθαί τινα ἄνθρωπον πρὶν
ἢ ὁ κατηγορούμενος
[ Matt. 1:18 TWi IWSHF, PRIN H SUNELQEIN AUTOUS
Matt. 26:34 TAUTHi THi NUKTI PRIN ALEKTORA FWNHSAI TRIS
Matt. 26:75 IHSOU EIRHKOTOS hOTI PRIN ALEKTORA FWNHSAI TRIS
Mark 14:30 TAUTHi THi NUKTI PRIN H DIS ALEKTORA
Mark 14:72 hO IHSOUS hOTI PRIN ALEKTORA FWNHSAI DIS
Luke 2:26 MH IDEIN QANATON PRIN [H]
Luke 22:61 EIPEN AUTWi hOTI PRIN ALEKTORA FWNHSAI SHMERON
John 4:49 KURIE, KATABHQI PRIN APOQANEIN TO PAIDION
John 8:58 LEGW hUMIN, PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI EGW
John 14:29 NUN EIRHKA hUMIN PRIN GENESQAI, hINA
Acts 2:20 hAIMA, PRIN ELQEIN hHMERAN KURIOU
Acts 7:2 EN THi MESOPOTAMIAi PRIN H KATOIKHSAI AUTON
Acts 25:16 CARIZESQAI TINA ANQRWPON PRIN H hO KATHGOROUMENOS]
> --- On Wed, 14/10/09, Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com> wrote:
>
> From: Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com>
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] PRIN before the birth of Abraham/the Muses.
> To: "Steven Cox" <stevencox_backonbgreek at yahoo.co.uk>
> Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Date: Wednesday, 14 October, 2009, 12:21 PM
>
>
> On Oct 14, 2009, at 4:15 AM, Steven Cox wrote:
>
>>
>> Hello folks,
>> please don't jump all over me, this is probably a very basic
>> question, but wasn't one I could see addressed in the Bgreek archive.
>>
>> I started with John 8:58 PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI (aor. inf. mid.)
>>
>>
>> and TWN PRIN MOUSAS GEGONENAI (perf. inf. act.)
>
> Prefaced Unscientific Peevish PreScript: To be perfectly honest and
> straightforward, Steven, I don't understand how you can expect
> anyone to respond to a message like this. While it seems clear
> enough that you'd like to understand the difference between usage of
> PRIN with an aorist infinitive and PRIN with a perfect infinitive of
> the same verb GINOMAI, you illustrate your question with more than
> half a dozen truncated and semi-digested citations from Platonic
> dialogues and later from Herodotus and Xenophon -- evidently the
> fruits of a Perseus search. Your citation style is haphazard, almost
> never providing sufficient context to grasp how the PRIN +
> infinitive construction is being used, and you cite these texts
> using a transliteration scheme (probably the Perseus scheme) that is
> not unintelligible but awkward to list-members more familiar with or
> more comfortable with the standard B-Greek transliteration scheme. I
> found that I had to go to the Greek text
> of the Phaedo and read through the whole section from which you've
> drawn your illustrations in order to observe the usage you're trying
> to raise questions about. After doing that I rather think the
> question could have been posed much more simply without your sending
> us the contents of your note pad in that undigested format. Enough
> then of that.
>
>>
>> before the birth of the muses, Plato, Phaidros. Socrates 259b
>>
>>
>> And had the question, why not PRIN ABRAAM GEGONENAI?
>
> Aye, verily, why not? While there's a nuance of difference, I don't
> think it would have altered the substance of the dialogue or the
> import of Jesus' response to his questioners in the passage under
> consideration.
>
> My take on this is as follows: PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI points to a
> moment of time when Abraham was born, while PRIN ABRAAM GEGONENAI
> points to a time span prior to Abraham's existence. I tend to think
> that the aspectual difference between the aorist and the perfect
> tense -- especially in contexts where the discourse is about events
> in time as here -- is not observed with any regularity in Koine
> Greek. I am inclined to think that the perfect tense is less
> commonly used (it's my belief that it is less commonly used, but I
> haven't done a search to test that) in the Koine than it was in
> Classical Attic and that one reason is that it (the perfect) is
> quite commonly used not in a stative sense but rather as an eventive
> verb indicating perfective action in the past. However, the perfect
> tense-forms may also represent a state, as it does in the two most
> commonly-used perfect-tense forms in Koine, OIDA and its compounds
> and hESTHKA and its compounds. GEGONENAI, on
> the other hand, when used as a stative, means "exist" or "have
> existence.," whereas GENESQAI means "come into existence" or "come
> to birth/get born."
>
> For practical purposes, I'd English PRIN ABRAAM GEGONENAI as "before
> Abraham's existence" and PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI as "before Abraham's
> birth."
>
> It's instructive in this context to compare the Johannine prologue,
> 1:3, particularly if we read it the traditional way, with hO GEGONEN
> understood as belonging with what precedes rather than with what
> follows:
>
> 3 πάντα δι᾿ αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο, καὶ
> χωρὶς αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο οὐδὲ ἕν ὃ
> γέγονεν
> [PANTA DI᾿ AUTOU EGENETO, KAI CWRIS AUTOU EGENETO OUDE hEN hO
> GEGONEN]
>
> Here EGENETO points to 'coming into existence' while GEGONEN points
> to existence as a state.
> I would English this as "Everything has come into existence through
> his agency and apart from him not a single thing that has existence
> has come into existence." -- or " ... and apart from him not a
> single existing thing has come into existence."
>
>
>>
>>
>> Then I've been looking through the "before [the soul] is born"
>> constructions in Plato's Phaedo 75-77, where PRIN GENESQAI and PRIN
>> GEGONENAI occur in contrast (?)
>>
>>
>> 75c prin genesthai ara
>>
>> 75c kai prin genesthai kai euthus
>>
>> 75e labontes prin genesthai
>>
>> 76e prin gegonenai
>>
>> 77a prin genesthai
>>
>> 77b hoti prin genesthai
>>
>> 77c hoti prin genesthai hêmas ên hêmôn hê psuchê
>> 77c prin genesthai ei mellei
>>
>> It makes reasonable sense to me why 76e is PRIN + perf.inf.act.
>>
>> [76e] huparchousan proteron aneuriskontes hêmeteran ousan, kai
>> tauta ekeinêi apeikazomen, anankaion, houtôs hôsper kai tauta
>> estin, houtôs kai tên hêmeteran psuchên einai kai prin gegonenai
>> hêmas: ei de mê esti tauta, allôs an ho logos houtos eirêmenos
>> eiê; ar' houtôs echei, kai isê anankê tauta te einai kai tas
>> hêmeteras psuchas prin kai hêmas gegonenai, kai ei mê tauta, oude
>> tade;
>> [76e] which we find existed previously and are now ours, and
>> compare our sensations with these, is it not a necessary inference
>> that
>> just as these abstractions exist, so our souls existed before we were
>> born; and if these abstractions do not exist, our argument is of no
>> force? Is this the case, and is it equally certain that provided
>> these
>> things exist our souls also existed before we were born, and that if
>> these do not exist, neither did our souls?”
>>
>> but that still doesn't really help me grasp why not PRIN ABRAAM
>> GEGONENAI. Can anyone provide any helpful comments. Is it related
>> to the following being EGW EIMI not EGW HN?
>
> I don't think so. I think that EGW HN would have raised both
> eyebrows and hackles as much as did EGW EIMI. Well, perhaps it's
> easier to understand PRIN ABRAAM GENESQAI than it is to understand
> EGW EIMI. ;-) Obviously there are many who are convinced that EGW
> EIMI harks back to Exodus 3 and there are others who rather doubt
> that. There are some who think that what EGW EIMI must ordinarily
> mean in Greek is "It's me" or "I'm the one." Perhaps the sense is "I
> continue to be the one you have to deal with." No doubt the
> formulation of John 8:56 was intended to be provocative and perhaps
> a little bit arcane. It still is, isn't it? I personally think that
> almost everything in our archives about John 8:56 is, at best,
> inconclusive.
>
>
>> PS - there was a secondary question of why not PRIN ABRAAM
>> GENNASQAI, but I think I'm okay on that one. Just noting in case
>> anyone has comments on that too.
>> nb. gennaw, prin .... gennasthai. - not found. except in Suda.
>
> Well, it's perfectly conceivable, but a discussion focused upon the
> exact pinpointing in time of begetting tends toward the direction of
> "when you were a sparkle in your father's eye" or the like. As I
> recall, the lengthy beginning of the length novel, Tristram Shandy,
> is a digression to end all digressions on pinpointing the moment of
> the protagonist's begetting.
>
>
>
>
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
>
>
>
>
>
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