[B-Greek] Ephesians 2:3 - TEKNA FUSEI ORGHS

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Tue Mar 30 16:16:09 EDT 2010


On Mar 30, 2010, at 3:51 PM, Richard Lindeman wrote:
> EN hOIS KAI hHMEIS PANTES ANESTRAFHMEN POTE EN TAIS EPIQUMIAIS THS SARKOS
> hHMWN POIOUNTES TA QELHMATA THS SARKOS KAI TWN DIANOIWN, KAI HMEQA TEKNA
> FUSEI ORGHS hWS KAI hOI LOIPOI
> 
> It’s another one of those form/function things. A noun in the dative case
> (form) seems to lend itself well for either adjectival or adverbial usage
> (function)?? 
> It causes me to wonder which is the more prevalent usage for dative nouns
> (adjectival or adverbial function).  It also causes me to wonder about
> dative case usage here. If FUSEI is functioning as an adverb the dative case
> usage vanishes entirely.  I don’t think that makes sense. Actually, I am
> having trouble seeing FUSEI as being construed in any way with the verb.
> Shouldn’t it would remain adjectival either in relation to “We”, the subject
> of HMEQA or in relation to TEKNA?

Can you adduce other examples of a dative noun functioning adjectivally?

Here are all the instances of FUSEI dative that I can find in the GNT:

Rom. 2:14 ὅταν γὰρ ἔθνη τὰ μὴ νόμον ἔχοντα φύσει τὰ τοῦ νόμου ποιῶσιν, οὗτοι νόμον μὴ ἔχοντες ἑαυτοῖς εἰσιν νόμος· 
Rom. 2:14 hOTAN GAR EQNH TA MH NOMON ECONTA FUSEI TA TOU NOMOU POIWSIN, hOUTOI NOMON MH ECONTES hEAUTOIS EISIN NOMOS· 

Gal. 2:15 Ἡμεῖς φύσει Ἰουδαῖοι καὶ οὐκ ἐξ ἐθνῶν ἁμαρτωλοί· 
Gal. 2:15 hHMEIS FUSEI IOUDAIOI KAI OUK EX EQNWN hAMARTWLOI· 

Gal. 4:8 	Ἀλλὰ τότε μὲν οὐκ εἰδότες θεὸν ἐδουλεύσατε τοῖς φύσει μὴ οὖσιν θεοῖς· 
Gal. 4:8 	ALLA TOTE MEN OUK EIDOTES QEON EDOULEUSATE TOIS FUSEI MH OUSIN QEOIS· 

Eph. 2:3 ἐν οἷς καὶ ἡμεῖς πάντες ἀνεστράφημέν ποτε ἐν ταῖς ἐπιθυμίαις τῆς σαρκὸς ἡμῶν ποιοῦντες τὰ θελήματα τῆς σαρκὸς καὶ τῶν διανοιῶν, καὶ ἤμεθα τέκνα φύσει ὀργῆς ὡς καὶ οἱ λοιποί· 
Eph. 2:3 EN hOIS KAI hHMEIS PANTES ANESTRAFHMEN POTE EN TAIS EPIQUMIAIS THS SARKOS hHMWN POIOUNTES TA QELHMATA THS SARKOS KAI TWN DIANOIWN, KAI HMEQA TEKNA FUSEI ORGHS hWS KAI hOI LOIPOI· 

James 3:7 πᾶσα γὰρ φύσις θηρίων τε καὶ πετεινῶν, ἑρπετῶν τε καὶ ἐναλίων δαμάζεται καὶ δεδάμασται τῇ φύσει τῇ ἀνθρωπίνῃ, 
James 3:7 PASA GAR FUSIS QHRIWN TE KAI PETEINWN, hERPETWN TE KAI ENALIWN DAMAZETAI KAI DEDAMASTAI THi FUSEI THi ANQRWPINHi, 

Apart from Eph 2:3, where I'm inclined to expect that FUSEI is adverbial with HMEQA, it is adverbial with POIWSIN in Rom 2:14, adverbial with an implicit ESMEN in Gala 2:15, adverbial with the participle OUSIN in Gal 4:8, and adverbial with DAMAZETAI KAI DEDAMASTAI in James 3:7.


Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)

>> 
>> Well, it may well be that Mark is right about what the author is saying here
>> about TEKNA FUSEI ORGHS. But I continue to be bothered by the
>> linguistic formulation wherein the dative noun appears to be used as
>> if adjectivally with the noun phrase TEKNA ORGHS.
>> 
>> C'est bon, c'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre! It was said.
>> 
>> I say, TEKNA FUSEI ORGHS seems intelligible enough, but is it
>> acceptable Greek?
>> 
>> To which the question is asked: "What do YOU know about what's
>> acceptable Greek?"
>> 
>> To which I reply: if you have to think twice about what the phrase
>> you read/hear means, there's more than meets the eye/ear in it.
>> 
>> 
>> Carl W. Conrad
>> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
>> 
>>> --- On Mon, 3/29/10, Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> From: Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com>
>>> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Ephesians 2:3 - TEKNA FUSEI ORGHS
>>> To: "Mark Lightman" <lightmanmark at yahoo.com>
>>> Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org, rhutchin at aol.com
>>> Date: Monday, March 29, 2010, 12:13 PM
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Mar 28, 2010, at 6:04 PM, Mark Lightman wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> --- On Sun, 3/28/10, rhutchin at aol.com <rhutchin at aol.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> <For the following phrases:
>>>> 
>>>> ...TEKNA FUSEI hORGHS...
>>>> 
>>>> ...FUSEI TEKNA hORGHS...
>>>> 
>>>> ...TEKNA hORGHS FUSEI...
>>> 
>>> Quibble: the word is ORGHS: there's no rough breathing on this noun.
>>> 
>>>> Does the ordering of the words change how one
>>>>  might understand what the writer means to say
>>>> or how a person might translate the phrase?>
>>>> 
>>>> No,  Not only is Greek word order flexible enough
>>>> to cover all three arrangements with little or no difference
>>>> in meaning, it is MORE than flexible enough to do this.
>>>> It's flexible enough, I mean, to do even MORE than this.
>>> 
>>> I'm not so sure about this one.
>>> 
>>> Text: 
>>> Eph. 2:3 ?? ??? ??? ????? ?????? ???????????? ???? ?? ???? ?????????? ???
>>> ?????? ???? ????????? ?? ???????? ??? ?????? ??? ??? ????????, ??? ?????
>>> ????? ????? ????? ?? ??? ?? ???????
>>> [EN hOIS KAI hHMEIS PANTES ANESTRAFHMEN POTE EN TAIS EPIQUMIAIS THS SARKOS
>>> hHMWN POIOUNTES TA QELHMATA THS SARKOS KAI TWN DIANOIWN, KAI HMEQA TEKNA
>>> FUSEI ORGHS hWS KAI hOI LOIPOI?]
>>> 
>>> The earlier discussion on this verse focused altogether upon the phase TEKNA
>>> ORGHS. I don't think anything was said about FUSEI here, and as I think about
>>> it, its position in the text between TEKNA and ORGHS seems less than
>>> transparent to me. I would have supposed that FUSEI construes with HMEQA or
>>> else with the whole clause HMEQA TEKNA ORGHS. The positioning of FUSEI in our
>>> text between TEKNA and ORGHS strikes me as strange, as I don't really see how
>>> the dative noun can construe with either the nominative or the genitive noun,
>>> as if it were adjectival ("natural children of wrath"). I really think the
>>> sense in the larger context must be: "we really were, in our inmost essence,
>>> condemned."
>>> 
>>> Mark may be right, claiming that any of Roger's suggested word-orders is as
>>> good as any other. But I'm not convinced. Does anyone think that FUSEI is
>>> intended by the author to be construed with the noun phrase TEKNA ORGHS
>>> rather than with the verb of the clause?
>>> 
>>> Carl W. Conrad
>>> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)







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