[B-Greek] Genitive absolute akin to the Latin ablative absolute?
John Barach, Sr
jbarach at motorera.com
Sun May 29 00:35:49 EDT 2011
If you are interested, my notes are now available on line
http://www.motorera.com/greek/lessons/lesson00.html
I've tried to make the information as simple as possible.
Cheers,
John Barach
On 27/05/2011 3:11 AM, Paul D. Nitz wrote:
> Brilliant. Thank you much!
> My African students now understand the Genitive Absolute.
> PD Nitz
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Barach, Sr"
> <jbarach at motorera.com>
> To: <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Monday, May 16, 2011 6:31 PM
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Genitive absolute akin to the Latin ablative
> absolute?
>
>
>> A good grammar text should explain the genitive absolute, but most are
>> not as clear in "plain English." So here are my notes about it.
>> Cheers,
>> John Barach
>> http://www.motorera.com
>>
>> 5B Genitive Absolute
>> 1C A special Greek construction which is used to distinguish the
>> subject of the participle which is different from the subject of the
>> main verb.
>> 2C In English, confusion results from what is called a dangling
>> participle
>> 1D After eating our lunch, the boat departed.
>> 2D The intention of this sentence is that we ate our lunch
>> and then the boat departed; but as it is worded, it sounds as though the
>> boat ate our lunch.
>> 3D The distinction is obvious in that sentence, but how
>> about this one:
>> After eating my lunch, Bill departed. Did I eat my
>> lunch, or did Bill eat my lunch?
>> 3C In Greek, the confusion is removed by putting the subject of
>> the participle and the participle itself into the Genitive case, while
>> the subject of the main verb stays in the Nominative case.
>> 4C Consider this sentence:
>> 1D εἰπόντες ταῦτα οἱ ἀπόστολοι ἀπῆλθον
>> After they said these things the apostles went away.
>> 2D ἀπόστολοι is the subject of the verb ἀπῆλθον and it has a
>> direct relation to the participle εἰπόντες.
>> 3D So the subject of the verb is the same subject of the
>> participle.
>> 5C Consider this sentence:
>> 1D εἰπόντων ταῦτα τῶν μαθητῶν οἱ ἀπόστολοι ἀπῆλον.
>> After the disciples said these things, the apostles went
>> away.
>> 2D The subject of the verb is ἀπόστολοι
>> 3D The subject of the participle εἰπόντων is μαθητῶν
>> 4D To avoid confusion of subjects, the subject of the
>> participle is put into the Genitive case (and so is the participle).
>> 5D In this construction, don’t translate it: Of saying these
>> things of the disciples, the apostles went away.
>> 6D When you see the participle and noun in the Genitive
>> case, translate it as a statement where the noun is the subject of the
>> participle.
>> 6C The problem with the boat eating our lunch is solved this way:
>> φαξάνων ἡμῶν τὸν δεῖπνον, τὸ πλοῖον ἀπῆλθε
>> After we ate our lunch, the boat departed.
>> Both ἡμῶν and φαξάνων are in the Genitive case, thus "we"
>> is the subject of the participle.
>> 7C λέγοντος αὐτοῦ ταῦτα ἀπῆλθον. While he was saying these
>> things, I went away.
>> Both λέγοντος αὐτοῦ are in the Genitive to distinguish that
>> he is doing the saying and I is doing the going.
>> 8C εἶδον αὐτὸν λέγοντα ταῦτα. I saw him while he was saying
>> these things.
>> 1D The subject of the main verb is different from the person
>> doing the saying.
>> 2D However, the Genitive Absolute is not used because the
>> participle has no direct grammatical relation to the rest of the
>> sentence.
>> 3D The participle is in the Accusative case to agree with
>> the pronoun which it modifies.
>> 9C ταῦτα εἰπόντων τῶν μαθητῶν οἱ δοῦλοι ἦλθον εἰς τὸν οἶκον
>> After the disciples said these things, the slaves went into the
>> house.
>> 10C γενομένης ἡμέρας οἱ ποιμένες ἀπῆλθον
>> When the day came, the shepherds went away.
>> 11C αὐτοῦ λέγοντος ταῦτα οἱ δοῦλοι ἀπῆλθον
>> While he was saying these things the slaves went away.
>>
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