[B-Greek] Why is the aspect of the historic present 'against its grain'?

Randall Buth randallbuth at gmail.com
Thu May 12 05:55:01 EDT 2011


>From another thread there was a note whose significance may
be easily overlooked.

Consider
Albert Rijksbaron,
"Syntax and Semantics of the Verb in Classical Greek", 3rd ed,
2002, p. 24
"The historic present is only found with terminative (telic),
not with stative (atelic) verbs."

This is a telling observation. (No comments on punning, Mark!)
It hints as to why and how the 'historic present' is able to function
pragmatically against its grammatical aspect.
Yes, the present indicative can commonly be used
PRAGMATICALLY against its SEMANTIC aspect.

The present indicative is aspectually 'imperfective'. However, when
used in past contexts it gets part of its rhetorical force by being
used against its semantic meaning.
Cf. Mark 8:22-23
ERXONTAI  'are coming' >> as if 'still on the way'
but contextually this is complete 'came'.
FEROYSIN 'are carrying' >> as if 'still bringing',
but contextually complete 'brought'.
PARAKALOYSIN 'are begging' >> as if 'in the process of begging'
but contextually complete 'begged'.
(Then with a new, central subject)
EPILABOMENOS ... EKSHNEGKEN
     'he (having taken) ... brought out' >> this is definitely after
all of the events in the above sequence,
and these events contextually complete and presented
as contextually complete.

EKSHNEGKEN becomes the first main-line, foregrounded, act of
story, followed by a backgrounded conversation introduced by
imperfects (also against their aspectual 'grain' for demotion, in
order to lead up to the main events)
and leading on to main line, foregrounded, aorist pasts for the
healing and other main points of the story (including an
imperfect correctly describing the situation 'open-endedly') .

Now what is important about Rijksbaron's comments is that
it explains how the historic present is able to function.
Stative verbs do not have any obvious 'endpoint' or telic
completion. Consequently, they are not candidates for
use as historic presents, since they cannot show themselves
as 'against the grain'. Their grammatical irony would not be
visible.

Telic verbs and telic verbal constructions, on the other hand,
have a natural completion and they can be evaluated in a
context. 'Coming' can have a natural, telic interpretation as
arrival to a particular place. By mentioning the place of arrival
and implying that the arrival 'happened' and author can extract
extra rhetorical effect by putting the verb in an aspect that
implies that the arrival had not yet happened.
It is a kind of grammatical irony.
To repeat, it is a "telic" verb, a verb with an 'endpoint', that
can be seen whether or not the endpoint was achieved.
Because of that, a telic verb can be used with ironic aspect.
They can be presented as if they did not yet achieve their
endpoint even though it is obvious in the context that they did.

Greeks loved it.

People following Porter don't get it. This lack of understanding
of a basic Greek grammatical irony is a relatively new
digression in NT interpretation, fortunately limited to the
last two decades and to a minority of practioners. This lack
of appreciation of the historical present will eventually clear
itself up and disappear.
And all the practioners reading the GNT will once again
appreciate the grammatical irony and rhetoric.

ERRWSQE
IWANHS


-- 
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicallanguagecenter.com
Biblical Language Center
Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life


More information about the B-Greek mailing list