Stephen Hughes wrote:Given this limited data set that you want to draw a parallel from, perhaps we could also consider that it is more likely to be used with a verb in the passive voice than it is in the active voice.
Greek doesn't have a passive voice.
Stephen Hughes wrote: Where πληροῦσθε is another passive, but followed by ἐν + dative rather than ὑπό + genitive in grammatical agreement or just because the personhood of the Holy Spirit had not been so clearly revealed at that time
Not necessarily. ἐν + dative maybe used to refer to an animate participant if that participant is conceived of as an instrument rather than a agent. Once instance where this would be the case is where the speaker views the referenced participant as an intermediary between the affected participant and the actual (unreferenced) agent. This is the case in Galatians 3:8 and Revelation 15:1.
Galatians 3:8 wrote:Ἐνευλογηθήσονται ἐν σοὶ πάντα τὰ ἔθνη
Revelation 15:1 wrote:ἀγγέλους ἑπτὰ ἔχοντας πληγὰς ἑπτὰ τὰς ἐσχάτας, ὅτι ἐν αὐταῖς ἐτελέσθη ὁ θυμὸς τοῦ θεοῦ.
But I'm not saying all instances of animate participants referred to with ἐν + dative are examples of this. That's just one possible reason of why a speaker might choose ἐν + dative. Personhood is not a relevant criteria.
Stephen Hughes wrote:I think that the fundamental distinction in this language between using ὑπό with the genitive with personal agents and the dative with impersonal agents is that the personal agent is a willing participant in the action sequence and that at the end we have two things left in mind, the result of the passive and the person that did it in a sort of referential comparision.
Well, you're not wrong. But you're not right either. The prototypical function of ἐν + dative is going to be an impersonal agent, but we need to distinguish between:
(1) Prototypical meaning and fundamental meaning.
The latter is a stronger claim, too strong in this case. "Fundamental" implies a hard and fast distinction. "Prototype" inherently assumes that there are divergences...and there are.
(2) The linguistic world and the external world.
When a speaker makes a choice to present a participant with a particular linguistic expression, in this case ἐν + dative, that speaker chooses a particular linguistic conceptualization. Whether that particular conceptualization has anything remotely like a direct correspondence to what exists in the external ("real") world is dependent upon the communicative needs of that speaker in that particular discourse context.
Here are a couple more examples...
1 Corinthians 1:5 wrote:ἐν παντὶ ἐπλουτίσθητε ἐν αὐτῷ ἐν παντὶ λόγῳ καὶ πάσῃ γνώσει
1 Corinthians 6:2 wrote:ἢ οὐκ οἴδατε ὅτι οἱ ἅγιοι τὸν κόσμον κρινοῦσιν; καὶ εἰ ἐν ὑμῖν κρίνεται ὁ κόσμος, ἀνάξιοί ἐστε κριτηρίων ἐλαχίστων;