[B-Greek] 2 Thess 2:15
George F Somsel
gfsomsel at yahoo.com
Thu Dec 30 17:47:19 EST 2010
In Hebrew the fact that there is a possessive does not necessarily indicate that
the noun is to be considered definite. I have lifted two examples from Futato,
_Beginning Biblical Hebrew_
סוּס־הַמֶּלֶךְ *the* king's horse (the horse of the king)סוּס־מֶלֶךְ *a* king's
horse (a horse of the king or perhaps a royal horse)
Whether the noun is considered definite or indefinite is determined not by the
construct relation (which is one way to indicate possession among other uses)
but by whether the nomen rectum is definite and not simply by its presence
following a noun in the construct. As noted, there are other ways to express
possession such as pronominal suffixes to nouns and the use of the prefixed
preposition ל with the "owner."
I really don't think an appeal to Hebrew can be used to determine how Greek may
have functioned.
george
gfsomsel
… search for truth, hear truth,
learn truth, love truth, speak the truth, hold the truth,
defend the truth till death.
- Jan Hus
_________
________________________________
From: Donald Vance <donaldrvance at mac.com>
To: Ken Penner <kpenner at stfx.ca>
Cc: "b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thu, December 30, 2010 1:52:18 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] 2 Thess 2:15
It seems to me that this is a question of "definiteness," which may be indicated
by a definite article. Does not the possessive serve to mark the noun and thus
make the article superfluous? If Paul had meant "any ole letter," this would
require specific grammatical marking, would it not?
In Biblical Hebrew, a possessive pronoun makes the noun definite and if one
wishes to indicate ownership of an indefinite entity, a prepositional phrase
with lamed is required.
מכתבנו "the letter of ours" = "our (specific) letter"
מכתב לנו "any ole letter of ours"
Sent from my iPhone
Donald R. Vance
Professor of Biblical Languages and Literature
Oral Roberts University
donaldrvance at mac.com
On Dec 30, 2010, at 2:06 PM, Ken Penner <kpenner at stfx.ca> wrote:
> I have always taught that the article may be dropped in a prepositional
phrase.
>
> Robertson's Grammar XVI.VIII(c) (page 791) has the following under "The Absence
>of the Article."
>
> "(c) PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES. These were also often considered definite enough
>without the article. So ἐν οἴκῳ (1 Cor. 11:34. Cf. ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ, ‘in the house,’
>Jo. 11:20)=‘at home.’ So we say “go to bed,” etc. Moulton pertinently cites
>English “down town,” “on ’change,” “in bed,” “from start to finish.” This idiom
>is not therefore peculiar to Greek. It is hardly necessary to mention all the N.
>T. examples, so common is the matter."
>
> "For διά note διά νυκτός (Ac. 5:19), διὰ μέσου (Lu. 4:30), διὰ μέσον (17:11)."
> "For classic examples see Gildersleeve, Syntax, p. 259 f. The papyri furnish
>abundant parallels (Völker, Syntax, pp. 15–17) as do the inscriptions
>(Radermacher, N. T. Gr., p. 92)."
>
> The next section continues:
>
> "(d) WITH BOTH PREPOSITION AND GENITIVE. It is not surprising to find no
>article with phrases which use both preposition and genitive like εἰς εὐαγγέλιον
>θεοῦ (Ro. 1:1), ἀπὸ ὀφθαλμῶν σου (Lu. 19:42), ἐκ δεξιῶν μου (Mt. 20:23), ἀπʼ
>ἀρχῆς κόσμου (Mt. 24:21), παρὰ καιρὸν ἡλικίας (Heb. 11:11), ἐν καιρῷ πειρασμοῦ
>(Lu. 8:13), ἀπὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου (Mt. 25:34), ἐν βραχίονι αὐτοῦ (Lu. 1:51),
>etc."
>
> I hope this helps,
>
>
> Ken M. Penner, Ph.D.
> Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic vocabulary memorization software:
> http://purl.org/net/kmpenner/flash/
> kpenner at stfx.ca
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
>[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Ehrman, Bart D
> Sent: Thursday, December 30, 2010 1:13 PM
> To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Subject: [B-Greek] 2 Thess 2:15
>
> In his commentary on 2 Thessalonians, W. Marxsen claims that since 2:15 εἴτε
>δι' ἐπιστολὴς ἡμῶν lacks an article (as in εἴτε δι' τῆς ἐπιστολὴς ἡμῶν) it does
>not refer back to a specific letter (e.g., to 1 Thessalonians) but is meant in a
>general sense to refer to any ole letter that he may have written (or not). If
>he had wanted to refer to 1 Thessalonians in particular, he would have used the
>article. I’m interested in the grammatical question. What do y’all think?
>
>
>
> n Bart Ehrman
>
>
>
> Bart D. Ehrman
>
> James A. Gray Professor
>
> Department of Religious Studies
>
> University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
>
>
>
> http://www.bartdehrman.com
>
>
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