[b-greek] Re: 1 Peter 5:1 Temporal reference?

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Thu Jul 20 2000 - 08:05:39 EDT


At 5:04 AM +0000 7/20/00, Mark Wilson wrote:
>hO KAI THS MELLOUSHS APOKALUPTESQAI DOXHS KOINWNOS
>
>1 Peter 5:1
>
>“So as your fellow elder and a witness of Christ’s sufferings and as one who
>shares in the glory that will be revealed, I urge the elders among you:”
>(NET Bible)
>
>My question has to do with the temporal reference in this clause.
>
>The NET Bible seems to translate hO KOINWNOS: “one who shares.”
>
>This seems to imply to me a “current state” of Peter. As if, “and as one who
>currently shares in the glory, the glory that will one day be revealed.” As
>if Peter is experiencing some kind of “fore taste.”
>
>Is there any substantiation for this temporal implication?
>
>Am I completely misunderstanding the English (NET Bible):
>
>“So as your fellow elder (CURRENTLY) and a witness of Christ’s sufferings
>(IN THE PAST) and as one who shares (CURRENTLY) in the glory that will be
>revealed (FUTURE), I urge the elders among you:”

I'm not sure exactly what the problem here is--other than the almost
all-encompassing paradoxicality of NT eschatological assertions perhaps
most succinctly described in the phrase, "already but not yet." I think
there may be many ways of imaging/imagining/picturing/conceptualizing the
overlapping of "this-world-age" and "the-age-to-come" as
represented/suggested in NT texts such as this one. I've always found it
easiest to conceive the Pauline representation of "redeemed" human
existence as simultaneous existence of the believer in both this-world and
in the age-to-come. One who is "in Christ" continues to exist in "this
present evil age" and has not yet fully become the person that one will be
"in the fullness of time" or at the Parousia of the Lord. Yet even so,
because Christ lives in the age-to-come and one is "in Christ," so the
believer also shares in the transcendence of the age-to-come. One of the
finest images of this in NT documents is in Heb 11:1 ESTIN DE PISTIS
ELPIZOMENWN hUPOSTASIS, PRAGMATWN
ELEGCOS OU BLEPOMENWN. and 11:9-10 of Abraham PISTEI PARWiKHSEN EIS GHN THS
EPAGGELIAS hWS ALLOTRIAN EN SKHNAIS KATOIKHSAS META ISAAK KAI IAKWB TWN
SUGKLHRONOMWN THS EPAGGELIAS THS AUTHS; EXEDECETO GAR THN TOUS QEMELIOUS
ECOUSAN POLIN hHS TECNITHS KAI DEMIOURGOS hO QEOS ... and 11:13 KATA PISTIN
APEQANON hOUTOI PANTES, MH LABONTES TAS EPAGGELIAS ALLA PORRWQEN AUTAS
IDONTES KAI ASPASAMENOI KAI hOMOLOGHSANTES hOTI XENOI KAI PAREPIDHMOI EISIN
EPI THS GHS.

Particularly in this last-cited verse note the phrase MH LABONTES TAS
EPAGGELIAS TAS EPAGGELIAS ALLA PORRWQEN IDONTES KAI ASPASAMENOI: the
implication seems to be that the life of faith is a life of anticipation of
the age-to-come while yet alive in this present age--and anticipation is a
sort of participation. That, I think, is what is involved in that word
KOINWNOS in 1 Peter 5:1.

I don't know if that helps any, but it seems to me that you have discovered
not a problem that is unique to 1 Peter 5:1 but that permeates NT
eschatological pronouncements to a very great extent. In Romans 8:22ff.
Paul relies upon the Jewish eschatological metaphor of the experience of
childbirth as simultaneous experience of present pain and joy that is to
come more fully hereafter. I don't think it would be very difficult to
discover several more of such instances of simultaneous present suffering
and foretaste of the future in the NT corpus.

--

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad@ioa.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/

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