Re: Romans 5:19 - DIKAIOI KATASTAQHSONTAI

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Fri Mar 13 1998 - 07:57:02 EST


At 2:38 AM -0600 3/13/98, Wes Williams wrote:
>In the scholarly commentary on KATASTAQHSONTAI at Romans 5:19, the general
>postures are (1) that this is a true future, (2) that it is a "logical"
>future due to the hWSPER - hOUTOS construction, (3) it can go either way
>depending on one's understanding of Paul's argument.
>
>DIKAIOI KATASTAQHSONTAI hOI POLLOI
>
>I've always viewed it as a future but the "logical" future argument makes
>sense from a synactical point of view. The problem is that I've never
>encountered much reading on what a "logical" future is. Can someone please
>elaborate?
>
>For just as through the disobedience of the one man many were constituted
>sinners,
>likewise also through the obedience of the one person many will be
>constituted righteous.

I don't really think there's anything very extraordinary here, nor that
there's a special category of futures termed "logical." It's just that the
way the analogy is constructed in terms of the eschatological antithesis of
the perishing world-age--OLAM-HA-ZEH, and the
world-age-to-come--OLAM-HA-BA, the act of the PRWTOS ANQRWPOS in the one
instance DID prove to be constitutive of the nature of humanity in the
perishing world-age, and the act of the ESCATOS ANQRWPOS in the other WILL
prove to have been constitutive of the nature of humanity in the
age-to-come. Which is to say simply that the tenses are accounted for by
the logic of the eschatological antithesis that is so neatly laid out in
this passage.

Or am I missing something?

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad@yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/



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