From: GregStffrd@aol.com
Date: Thu Dec 23 1999 - 16:50:32 EST
In a message dated 12/23/99 11:31:10 AM Pacific Standard Time,
scmiller@www.plantnet.com writes:
<< The problem I have with Dr.
Conrad's interpretation of John 8:58 is that he seems to be taking a
present tense EIMI and interpreting it as a historical present. Perhaps I'm
mistaken, but it seems to me that there is no real evidence (elsewhere) of
the present tense of EIMI being used in this manner. Where as my
interpretation of this passage interprets EIMI as a present tense. >>
Dear Steven:
I do not believe Carl views EIMI in John 8:58 as an historical present, but I
will let him clarify his position, if he so chooses. However, even Wallace,
to whom you make reference, admits that such a view of EIMI in John 8:58 is
not impossible (Wallace, Greek Grammar, 530, note 47).
Still, I find that many who reject a preexistent sense for this verse tend to
isolate EIMI from the adverbial clause referring to a past time. When a
present verb (such as EIMI) is used with a past expression, it is quite
legitimate to view the entire expression as conveying existence from the
period denoted by the past expression, up to the present. Several grammarians
have noticed this idiom involving EIMI in John 8:58, including: F. Blass and
A. Debrunner, A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian
Literature, trans. Robert W. Funk (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1961), 168, sec. 322 (cited erroneously as John 5:58); McKay, A New Syntax of
the Verb in New Testament Greek (SBG 5; New York: Peter Lang, 1994), 41-42;
Nigel Turner, A Grammar of New Testament Greek, vol. 3, Syntax (Edinburgh: T
& T Clark, 1963), 62, sec. 1(c); George Benedict Winer, A Grammar of the
Idiom of the New Testament, trans. J. Henry Thayer (Andover: Warren Draper,
1897), 267.
McKay is the only one of these grammarians to actually translate John 8:58.
He does so as follows, "I have been in existence since before Abraham was
born." As you allude to, Wallace considers McKay's classification of EIMI as
a present extending from the past more "nuanced" than those who view EIMI as
a historical present, but nonetheless he believes "John 8:58 lacks sufficient
parallels to be convincing" (Wallace, Greek Grammar, 531, note 48). Wallace
does not specify what kind of "parallels" he has in mind, though he likely is
referring to other uses of EIMI as an extending-from-the-past present. If so,
then we could cite at least two examples from the NT (Joh 14:9; 15:27) and at
least four from the LXX (Ge 31:38, 41; Jg 16:17; Ps 90:2).
But even if we had no other examples of EIMI functioning as part of this
idiom, that is not grounds for dismissing such a use in John 8:58. If it
were, then what would we say about the use of DOULEUW in Luke 15:29? Here it
is surely an extension-from-past present, but nowhere else in the NT is it so
used. What about DOKEW in 2 Corinthians 12:19? It is not used as a present of
past action still in progress (PPA) anywhere else in NT, but who doubts its
use as such in 2 Corinthians 12:19?
It is also worth noting that the Peshitta uses the time-indifferent particle
of existence ith, having the rendering 'ena 'ithai, which, similar to the
English participle, must take its time from the context. However, the
Curetonian has an excellent translation, which preserves the present and the
past element found in the Greek, 'ena 'ith hawith ("I is was").
So, there is every reason to view EIMI in John 8:58, together with the past
expression, as an instance of a well-known Greek idiom designed to gather up
the past and the present in a single expression.
Best Regards,
Greg Stafford
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