Re: Gal 1:6

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Sat Dec 11 1999 - 06:20:58 EST


At 6:12 PM -0600 12/10/99, Steven Craig Miller wrote:
>To: Dr. Carlton L. Winbery, Byron Knutson, et al.,
>
>CLW: << Thus I would translate QAUMAZW OTI hOUTWS TACEWS METATIQESQE APO
>TOU KALESANTOS hUMAS EN CARITI EIS hETERON EUAGGELION as "I am amazed that
>you are so readily moved from the one who called you by grace to another
>gospel." >>
>
>FWIW ... and perhaps contrary to popular opinion, I would take METATIQESQE
>as passive, rather than middle, and so translate this passage as: "I am
>amazed that so quickly you have been turned away from your calling by
>[Christ's] grace into a different gospel" (Gal 1:6 MOT).
>
>By taking METATIQESQE as a passive (or at least a possible passive), I
>would then accuse St. Paul of having some pastoral sensibilities. For he
>seems here to put the bulk of the blame on another. I see the same
>rhetorical strategy at work when he states "there are some who are
>confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ" (Gal 1:7); when he
>asks "Who has bewitched you?" (Gal 3:1); and also when he says: "I wish
>those who unsettle you would castrate themselves!" (Gal 5:12). In each of
>these statements the blame has shifted away from the Galatians onto someone
>else. It is a very pastoral rhetorical strategy at work here I think. (The
>suggestion of taking METATIQESQE as passage appears in LSJM under METATIQHMI.)
>
>Of course, that has nothing to do with the original question.

True, and inasmuch as it really concerns the nature of Paul's manner of
dealing with the congregation in this particular letter, it's a discussion
that might more profitably be dealt with on the Corpus Paulinum list.

On the other hand, the question of taking METATIQESQE as passive (or even
as "passage"?) is of some interest in itself and indeed germane to this
forum. As usual when it comes to a decision between understanding a M/P
form as either middle or passive, my inclination is to take it as middle
rather than passive unless there is some clear indication of either an
agent or an external instrument effecting the action in question. So I
seize the opportunity to quibble (and it is a quibble, albeit one I'm
serious about) in this instance and suggest a reflexive sense that is not
at all inconsistent, I think, with the above interpretation of Paul's
"pastoral" strategy: suppose we understand the Greek to mean, "I'm
surprised that you are allowing yourselves so quickly to be turned away
from the one who called you by grace to another gospel." (and by the way,
isn't Carlton's understanding--in his version which is cited at the head of
this message--closer to a passive than a middle understanding of the voice
of METATIQESQE here?). There's another minor point too: although Steven has
formulated the tense of METATIQESQE in his version as a present perfect ("
... that so quickly you have been turned away ..."), it seems to me that
Paul's choice of a present tense is itself well-suited to a pastoral
stance: the shift of commitment is NOT one that has been completed; rather
it is one that he hopes to avert by the intense argumentation he is about
to set forth in the letter ahead.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/

---
B-Greek home page: http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek
You are currently subscribed to b-greek as: [cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu]
To unsubscribe, forward this message to leave-b-greek-329W@franklin.oit.unc.edu
To subscribe, send a message to subscribe-b-greek@franklin.oit.unc.edu


This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Sat Apr 20 2002 - 15:40:49 EDT