[B-Greek] Strange Construction in Philo De specialibus legibus 1:345
Brian Abasciano
bvabasciano at gmail.com
Fri Jun 18 22:58:05 EDT 2010
I think what I find unusual is the impression of a piling up of attirbutive positions within one another (for lack of a better way of putting it; and perhaps it is only impression), and perhaps the most striking thing is that the article of TACIN is within hOI . . . TETAGMENOI while TACIN is outside of it. Would you say that is normal word order in literary Greek (article for a substantival particple [or equivalent] -- article for a noun [or equivalent] -- substantival participle [or equivalent] -- noun [or equivalent]; of course the prepositional phrase complicates the clause further)?
Brian Abasciano
----- Original Message -----
From: cwconrad2
To: Brian Abasciano
Cc: B-Greek
Sent: Friday, June 18, 2010 5:34 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Strange Construction in Philo De specialibus legibus 1:345
On 18 Jun, 2010,at 03:13 PM, Brian Abasciano <bvabasciano at gmail.com> wrote:
A friend sent me the following question about an unusual Greek construction in Philo De specialibus legibus 1:345, which I am forwarding, edited and adapted a little for the list. I responded to him with my opinion, but I am interested in hearing the opinions of list members. Here is his question (without any comments from me):
Brian Abasciano
Philo De specialibus legibus 1:345 --
ALL᾽ hHMEIS GE hOI FOITHTAI KAI GNWRIMOI TOU PROFHTOU MWUSEWS THN TOU
ONTOS ZHTHSIN OU MEQHSOMEQA, THN EPISTHMHN AUTOU TELOS EUDAIMONIAS
EINAI NOMIZONTES KAI ZWHN MAKRAIWNA, KAQA KAI hO NOMOS FHSI TOUS
PROSKEIMENOUS TWi QEWi ZHN ἅPANTAS, DOGMA TIQEIS ANAGKAION KAI
FILOSOFON. ONTWS GAR hOI MEN AQEOI TAS YUXAS TEQNASIN, hOI DE THN PARA
TWi ONTI QEWi TETAGMENOI TACIN AQANATON BION ZWSIN.
It is the last clause that is of interest . . .
hOI DE THN PARA TWi ONTI QEWi TETAGMENOI TACIN AQANATON BION ZWSIN
But the construction has me a bit confused. The primary verb is ZWSIN - "they live." We have the nominative article which should be attached to the participle TETAGMENOI as the subject. The conjunction follows, which is pretty normal. Then we have another article in the accusative, which I would assume would be tied to clause TACIN AQANATON BION ZWSIN - "an ordered (or "arranged") immortal life." (I would assume Philo would use a more Greek phrasiology here.) But the accusative article seems very distant from this clause.
We also have the dative prepositional phrase PARA TWi ONTI QEWi ("being alongside the God") interspersed after the accusative, and unfortunately, after the nominative articles. The proximity to the accusative article makes me want to tie it to the predicate, yielding "an ordered immortal life being alongside the god." But it is immediately followed by the nominative participle, which also yields a possible proximity. So here we might have - "the ones appointed (or disposed) alongside of the god."
So where would you place the prepositional phrase? Is it modifying the subject or the predicate?
And why such an odd arrangement of the forms? (You would think these authors would learn their Greek a bit better. :-) )
I really don't see what the problem is. Obviously TETAGMENOI goes with hOI DE, THN PARA TWi ONTI QEWi TAXIN: "those who have taken their station before the real God live a life without death."
The verb is the middle TASSOMAI and it here takes TAXIN as its object; the TAXIS here is identified as being PARA TWi ONTI QEWi
The word-order is not uncommon in literary Greek. Perhaps Mike Aubrey might want to comment on the word-order. I've found this sort of pattern not infrequently in Greek hexameter and elegiac poetry.
Carl W. ConradDepartment of Classics, Washington University (ret)1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243cwconrad at artsci.wustl.eduWWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list