[B-Greek] 1 Timothy 4:3: KWLUONTWN YAMEIN, APECESQAI

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Mon May 31 11:41:11 EDT 2010


On May 31, 2010, at 10:42 AM, Tom Moore wrote:
> I'm confused by the dual infinitive "hindering to marry, to abstain from foods..." in 1 Timothy 4:3:
> 
> κωλυόντων γαμεῖν, ἀπέχεσθαι βρωμάτων, ἃ ὁ θεὸς ἔκτισεν εἰς μετάλημψιν μετὰ εὐχαριστίας τοῖς πιστοῖς καὶ ἐπεγνωκόσιν τὴν ἀλήθειαν.
> 
> KWLUONTWN YAMEIN, APECESQAI BRWMATWN, hA hO QEOS EKTISEN EIS METALHMYIN META EUCARISTIAS TOIS PISTOIS KAI EPEGNWKOSIN THN ALHQEIAN
> 
> This is universally translated as certain persons are doing two things: 1) forbidding marriage, and 2) commanding abstinence from certain foods.
> 
> Is this bad grammar, that this verse doesn't explicitly say something like παραγγελλοντων ἀπέχεσθαι [PARAGGELLONTWN APECESQAI], "commanding to abstain"?
> 
> Or is it possible, instead, that these certain persons are only forbidding marriage, and (grammatically) Paul is likening this forbidding of marriage to the abstinence from certain foods [an issue, as with circumcision, that the church has already settled does not need to be observed]?

I wouldn't call it bad grammar so much as inconcinnity or inelegance; it's surely a constructio ad sensum, as if KWLUONTWN were KELEUONTWN MH GAMEIN and then adding a second prohibition wherein the negation is expressed in the infinitive rather than in the introductory verb. The intended meaning doesn't seem to be in doubt; it's just that it's not very neatly expressed.

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






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