[b-greek] Re: Wallace on Ga 4:14

From: Stephen C. Carlson (scarlson@mindspring.com)
Date: Mon Sep 18 2000 - 23:53:18 EDT


At 10:50 PM 9/18/00 EDT, CEP7@aol.com wrote:
> a) Clear Examples (Definite-Definite)
> Matt 3:16 PNEUMA QEOU93
> the Spirit of God
>
> A nonsensical translation would be “a spirit of a god.” The point of
>Apollonius’ Corollary is that when both nouns are anarthrous and it can be
>determined that one is definite, then the other is also definite. Thus in the
>above example, if theou is definite, so is pneuma. [* * *]
>
>Wallace's point is that the corollary applies to AGGELOS KURIOU/QEOU. Thus,
>grammatically speaking, it is more likely that AGGELOS QEOU in Gal 4:14
>should be translated the angel of God (Definite-Definite).

It occurs to me that English has an analogous structure that
employs the inflected possesive form of a definite noun, as
in "God's Spirit" or "God's messenger."

Thus, I offer the following translations:

Matt. 3:16 ... KAI EIDEN PNEUMA QEOU KATABAINON hWSEI PERISTERAN ...
           ... and he saw God's Spirit descending like a dove ...

Gal. 4:14 ... ALLA hWS AGGELON QEOU EDEXASQE ME, hWS CRISTON IHSOUN.
          ... but you welcomed me as God's messenger, as Christ Jesus.

I think the definiteness/qualitativeness/indefiniteness of the
construction depends more on the semantic properties of the
head noun rather upon its grammar.

Stephen Carlson
--
Stephen C. Carlson mailto:scarlson@mindspring.com
Synoptic Problem Home Page http://www.mindspring.com/~scarlson/synopt/
"Poetry speaks of aspirations, and songs chant the words." Shujing 2.35

---
B-Greek home page: http://metalab.unc.edu/bgreek
You are currently subscribed to b-greek as: [jwrobie@mindspring.com]
To unsubscribe, forward this message to leave-b-greek-327Q@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 - 15:36:36 EDT