Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

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Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Stephen Carlson »

The Critical Text for 1 Thess 4:9 reads:
1 Thess 4:9 wrote:Περὶ δὲ τῆς φιλαδελφίας οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε γράφειν ὑμῖν, αὐτοὶ γὰρ ὑμεῖς θεοδίδακτοί ἐστε εἰς τὸ ἀγαπᾶν ἀλλήλους,
Normally the unexpressed subject of an infinitive is that of its controlling finite verb, but that does just not make sense in this context: "Now concerning brotherly love, you don't need to write you, etc."

What's going on here?

It should come to no surprise that there is much variation here in the textual history. An impressive set of MSS (D*FG 1739-Ψ-hark-1505) read ἔχομεν instead of ἔχετε, which is unproblematic ("we don't need to write you"). This apparently is the approach of the NIV. Codex Vaticanus (B) similarly reads the imperfect εἴχομεν ("we didn't need to write you"), which I interpret as indirect support for the Western-1739 agreement. A few MSS harmonize to 1 Thess 5:1 and have a middle-passive infinitive γραφέσθαι, which is a little better ("you don't need to be written to").

Many translations (NRSV, NASB, NET, etc.) supply "anyone" as if the text read: οὐ χρείαν ἔχετέ τινα γράφειν ὑμῖν. This sounds like a conjectural emendation by translation. If I were to emend the text, however, I'd prefer to supply ἡμᾶς instead οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ἡμᾶς γράφειν ὑμῖν ("you don't need us to write you"), not τινά.

At any rate, the question isn't about the text-critical aspects (except to help substantiate the harshness of the NA27 reading), but about understanding the syntax of the Critical Text. What is the implied subject of this infinitive? Is the text corrupt?
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by cwconrad »

Stephen Carlson wrote:The Critical Text for 1 Thess 4:9 reads:
1 Thess 4:9 wrote:Περὶ δὲ τῆς φιλαδελφίας οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε γράφειν ὑμῖν, αὐτοὶ γὰρ ὑμεῖς θεοδίδακτοί ἐστε εἰς τὸ ἀγαπᾶν ἀλλήλους,
Normally the unexpressed subject of an infinitive is that of its controlling finite verb, but that does just not make sense in this context: "Now concerning brotherly love, you don't need to write you, etc."

What's going on here?

It should come to no surprise that there is much variation here in the textual history. An impressive set of MSS (D*FG 1739-Ψ-hark-1505) read ἔχομεν instead of ἔχετε, which is unproblematic ("we don't need to write you"). This apparently is the approach of the NIV. Codex Vaticanus (B) similarly reads the imperfect εἴχομεν ("we didn't need to write you"), which I interpret as indirect support for the Western-1739 agreement. A few MSS harmonize to 1 Thess 5:1 and have a middle-passive infinitive γραφέσθαι, which is a little better ("you don't need to be written to").

Many translations (NRSV, NASB, NET, etc.) supply "anyone" as if the text read: οὐ χρείαν ἔχετέ τινα γράφειν ὑμῖν. This sounds like a conjectural emendation by translation. If I were to emend the text, however, I'd prefer to supply ἡμᾶς instead οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ἡμᾶς γράφειν ὑμῖν ("you don't need us to write you"), not τινά.

At any rate, the question isn't about the text-critical aspects (except to help substantiate the harshness of the NA27 reading), but about understanding the syntax of the Critical Text. What is the implied subject of this infinitive? Is the text corrupt?
This is a speculative response, no more. The translations supplying "anyone" may be doing so simply to satisfy the requirements of intelligible English. It seems to me that the force of the Greek (in the critical text) is "You people don't need writing to -- not you!" The emphasis is not on who should write to the Thessalonian congregation but on the qualification of the Thessalonians themselves. If we feel the need to supply a subject for γράφειν, it might as well be "Tom, Dick, or Harry"; the emphasis is on who's being written to, certainly not on who's doing the writing.
οὔτοι ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς πάντα θεοὶ θνητοῖς ὑπέδειξαν,
ἀλλὰ χρόνῳ ζητέοντες ἐφευρίσκουσιν ἄμεινον. (Xenophanes, Fragment 16)

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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Stephen Carlson »

cwconrad wrote:This is a speculative response, no more. The translations supplying "anyone" may be doing so simply to satisfy the requirements of intelligible English. It seems to me that the force of the Greek (in the critical text) is "You people don't need writing to -- not you!" The emphasis is not on who should write to the Thessalonian congregation but on the qualification of the Thessalonians themselves. If we feel the need to supply a subject for γράφειν, it might as well be "Tom, Dick, or Harry"; the emphasis is on who's being written to, certainly not on who's doing the writing.
As with the case with many of these "harsh" (Metzger's term here) constructions, the sense seems clear enough even though the syntax is not.

I'd feel happier if I had some decent parallels for this construction. The same point could be made with γράφεσθαι as in 1 Thess 5:1. BDF § 395(1) just says it's "incorrect":
BDF § 393(5) wrote:1 Th 4:19 οὐ χρείαν ἔχομεν γράφειν ὑμῖν ScD* al.; ἔχετε γράφειν S*ADc al. is incorrect, but ἔχετε γράφεσθαι (= 5:1) H al. is correct. Cf. Mayser II 1, 318; with ὥστε Plato, Ep. 6.322c.
I think Mayser is online, so I'll have to look up what he had to say, as well as the Plato parallel.
Last edited by Stephen Carlson on June 5th, 2012, 10:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Fixed citation
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Stephen Carlson wrote:
BDF § 393(5) wrote:1 Th 4:19 οὐ χρείαν ἔχομεν γράφειν ὑμῖν ScD* al.; ἔχετε γράφειν S*ADc al. is incorrect, but ἔχετε γράφεσθαι (= 5:1) H al. is correct. Cf. Mayser II 1, 318; with ὥστε Plato, Ep. 6.322c.
I think Mayser is online, so I'll have to look up what he had to say, as well as the Plato parallel.
The Mayser text is online at: http://archive.org/stream/p1grammatikde ... 3/mode/2up but it only discusses the χρείαν ἔχειν construction generally.

The Plato parallel illustrates the idiom but not the issue with the implied subject of the infinitive as in the critical text of 1 Thess 4:9:
Plato, Epistulae 6.322c, wrote:οἰκεῖτε γὰρ δὴ γείτονές τε ὑμῖν αὐτοῖς καὶ χρείαν ἔχοντες ὥστε ἀλλήλους εἰς τὰ μέγιστα ὠφελεῖν.
For you dwell near together as neighbors in close association so that you can help one another in the things of greatest importance. (trans. Bury)
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Alex Hopkins »

Stephen Carlson wrote:The Critical Text for 1 Thess 4:9 reads:
1 Thess 4:9 wrote:
Περὶ δὲ τῆς φιλαδελφίας οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε γράφειν ὑμῖν, αὐτοὶ γὰρ ὑμεῖς θεοδίδακτοί ἐστε εἰς τὸ ἀγαπᾶν ἀλλήλους,
Normally the unexpressed subject of an infinitive is that of its controlling finite verb, but that does just not make sense in this context: "Now concerning brotherly love, you don't need to write you, etc."
I was reading last night the following passage from Demosthenes' On the Crown, which prompted me to think of Stephen's post, wondering if it might be of interest. I'll give a longer extract than perhaps necessary, to give some context. (The words are addressed to Aeschines, who has brought a prosecution against Demosthenes' client, Ctesiphon.)
Demosthenes, On the Crown, 259 wrote: ... ἀνὴρ δὲ γενόμενος τῇ μητρὶ τελούσῃ τὰς βίβλους ἀνεγίγνωσκες καὶ τἄλλα συνεσκευωροῦ, τὴν μὲν νύκτα νεβρίζων καὶ κρατηρίζων καὶ καθαίρων τοὺς τελουμένους καὶ ἀπομάττων τῷ πηλῷ καὶ τοῖς πιτύροις, καὶ ἀνιστὰς ἀπὸ τοῦ καθαρμοῦ κελεύων λέγειν ‘ἔφυγον κακόν, εὗρον ἄμεινον,᾿ κτλ
Pickard, in translation, wrote:Then, when you became a man, you used to read out the books to your mother at her initiations, and help her in the rest of the hocus-pocus, by night dressing the initiated in fawnskins, drenching them from the bowl, purifying them and wiping them down with the clay and the bran, and (when they were purified) bidding them stand up and say, 'The ill is done, the good begun,' ...
κελεύων is in agreement with the subject of the verbs ἀνεγίγνωσκες and συνεσκευωροῦ, i.e. Aeschines, while the subject of the infinitive λέγειν is the initiates. It's not explicitly stated as the subject of the infinitive but τοὺς τελουμένους is easily enough understood from the previous clause. Whether this makes it distinct from 1 Thess 4:9 or similar to it depends, I suppose, on how easy we consider it to be to understand the unexpressed subject of γράφειν.

Similar is
BGT Hebrews 13:19 περισσοτέρως δὲ παρακαλῶ τοῦτο ποιῆσαι, ἵνα τάχιον ἀποκατασταθῶ ὑμῖν.
NIV Hebrews 13:19 I particularly urge you to pray so that I may be restored to you soon.
Again the "you" subject of the infinitive, ποιῆσαι, is unstated, but easy enough to understand from the context of the preceding verses. The verbs κελεύων and παρακαλῶ most naturally imply an address to one other than oneself, and so the understanding of the subject is perhaps easier than the 1 Thess 4:9 example.

Also interesting is Acts 16:22: καὶ συνεπέστη ὁ ὄχλος κατ᾿ αὐτῶν καὶ οἱ στρατηγοὶ περιρήξαντες αὐτῶν τὰ ἱμάτια ἐκέλευον ῥαβδίζειν, κτλ (Of Paul and Silas). NIV translates "the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten". The use of these passives in translation obscures the fact that the subject of ῥαβδίζειν is not made explicit. FFBruce says "This beating with rods was carried out by the lictors, the ῥαβδοῦχοι of ver. 35 (q.v.)."

Another example where the subject of the infinitive is not that of the finite verb is Acts 15:19, where again context makes the sense easy enough.
διὸ ἐγὼ κρίνω μὴ παρενοχλεῖν τοῖς ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν ἐπιστρέφουσιν ἐπὶ τὸν θεόν, 20 ἀλλὰ ἐπιστεῖλαι αὐτοῖς τοῦ ἀπέχεσθαι τῶν ἀλισγημάτων τῶν εἰδώλων καὶ τῆς πορνείας καὶ τοῦ πνικτοῦ καὶ τοῦ αἵματος.


The subject of παρενοχλεῖν and of ἐπιστεῖλαι is not "I" but "we". "It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. 20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. (Act 15:19, 20 NIV)

Acts 24:23 yields a plurality of infinitives with different subjects; I'll cite the previous verse for context:
Acts 24:22 Ἀνεβάλετο δὲ αὐτοὺς ὁ Φῆλιξ, ἀκριβέστερον εἰδὼς τὰ περὶ τῆς ὁδοῦ εἴπας, Ὅταν Λυσίας ὁ χιλίαρχος καταβῇ, διαγνώσομαι τὰ καθ᾿ ὑμᾶς 23 διαταξάμενος τῷ ἑκατοντάρχῃ τηρεῖσθαι αὐτὸν ἔχειν τε ἄνεσιν καὶ μηδένα κωλύειν τῶν ἰδίων αὐτοῦ ὑπηρετεῖν αὐτῷ.

RSV: "Then he gave orders to the centurion that he should be kept in custody but should have some liberty, and that none of his friends should be prevented from attending to his needs."
This may be taken as a mixed construction, with αὐτόν (i.e. Paul) being subject-accusative of the verbs τηρεῖσθαι (understood as passive) and ἔχειν, with the subject of κωλύειν reverting to the centurion. But if τηρεῖσθαι is to be understood as middle, then its subject is also understood out of τῷ ἑκατοντάρχῃ, - an understanding which requires that the subject of the first and third infinitives be understood to be the centurion, while the subject of the second is to be understood as Paul. (The differences in understanding of the grammar of the verse are reflected in differences in translation; compare the RSV with, say, the NIV translation.) Either way, the change in subject must be understood according to sense, as it is not determined by grammar.

Because sense and context play the significant role in the determination of the subject of the infinitives in these instances, I'm less inclined than Metzger to think of the construction in 1 Thess 4:9 as "harsh". At any rate, I hope that these examples may be of some interest.

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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Tony Pope »

Milligan in his commentary (1908) says:
The use of the act. inf. (γράφειν) for the pass. (γράφεσθαι, cf. 5.1) is too amply vouched for in similar combinations to cause any difficulty: see W[iner-]M[oulton] p.426, Buttmann p. 259 n1.
Winer: http://archive.org/stream/atreatiseongr ... 8/mode/2up
Buttmann (see bottom of page and footnote): http://archive.org/stream/cu31924021607 ... 3/mode/2up

However, Lünemann vehemently disagrees, see http://archive.org/stream/criticalexege ... 8/mode/2up. Lünemann on p. 104 labels ἔχετε here as "meaningless" and reads the variant ἔχομεν instead.

Any thoughts on Lünemann's objections?
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Alex Hopkins wrote:Because sense and context play the significant role in the determination of the subject of the infinitives in these instances, I'm less inclined than Metzger to think of the construction in 1 Thess 4:9 as "harsh". At any rate, I hope that these examples may be of some interest.
Thank you very much, Alex. These examples are really helpful, especially so since they are not treated at all on this point in my "go to" grammars. So your finding them is impressive.

As a result of your research, I am inclined to disagree with BDF that the construction is "incorrect." I have some sympathy with Metzger's opinion about its harshness for us, because the literary context is less helpful in 1 Thess 4:9 than in the other examples (but we lack the benefit of the previous correspondence from the Thessalonians to Paul). The only real clue is the implicit contrast with God in θεοδίδακτοί, so I might supply ἄνθρωπον or τινα as the implied subject, or, even better, take advantage of the ability in English to promote indirect objects to the subjects of passive verbs and render it as "you don't need to be written to."
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Alex Hopkins »

Thanks for your response, Stephen; I'm glad the references were of some use.

Tony Pope referred to Lünemann (who on p. 104 of his Critical and exegetical handbook to the Epistles to the Thessalonians (1880) labels ἔχετε here as "meaningless" and reads the variant ἔχομεν instead; see http://archive.org/stream/criticalexege ... 8/mode/2up), and asked "Any thoughts on Lünemann's objections?"

Tony, I'm not sure if the question was directed to me particularly, but since your response followed straight after my post I'll assume so.

First, thanks for the references; I'm glad you joined the discussion, as the references you provided, and the widening circle that I chased up from them, were of much interest.

I had a look at Lünemann and, from the authors he acknowledges who take a contrary view, Buttmann; I also looked at Milligan. Lünemann deals particularly with that group of infinitives in the active voice "where one would expect the infinitive passive." (His italics) He does so because it is on these lines that others have defended the reading or understanding which he finds inadmissible. So I think your question is an apt one.

Now, if Lünemann's argument is as accurate as his referencing Thucydides, the game is up for him. Where he refers to Themistocles and cites Thucydides i. 38, the reference should in fact be to i.138.
ἦν γὰρ ὁ Θεμιστοκλῆς βεβαιότατα δὴ φύσεως ἰσχὺν δηλώσας καὶ διαφερόντως τι ἐς αὐτὸ μᾶλλον ἑτέρου ἄξιος θαυμάσαι:
Indeed, Themistocles was a man who showed an unmistakable natural genius; and in this respect he was quite exceptional, and beyond all others deserves our admiration. (Finley)
The examples I provided in my previous post were not intended to illustrate that particular group of infinitives which might be rendered as passives, but rather were provided to suggest that the determination of the subject of an infinitive may be reliant upon sense and context, and so may be a matter of judgement rather than grammar alone. I suspect that part of the difficulty we have with such infinitives is simply that they fall squarely into that group of Greek constructions where there is no one-to-one correspondence with a literal Englishing of them (or, if you like, there is a "cross-linguistic mismatch"). And so with ἄξιος θαυμάσαι it is easier for us to render "worthy to be admired" or "deserves our admiration", because a literal translation would not yield idiomatic English. That Finley here gives "deserves our admiration" might suggest "we" as the subject of the infinitive, but that in itself, really, is misleading, reflecting our patterned thinking whereby the active infinitive in such instances requires a subject.

In my earlier post I mentioned Acts 16:22: καὶ συνεπέστη ὁ ὄχλος κατ᾿ αὐτῶν καὶ οἱ στρατηγοὶ περιρήξαντες αὐτῶν τὰ ἱμάτια ἐκέλευον ῥαβδίζειν, κτλ (Of Paul and Silas). NIV translates "the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten". The use of these passives in translation obscures the fact that the subject of ῥαβδίζειν is not made explicit. FFBruce says "This beating with rods was carried out by the lictors, the ῥαβδοῦχοι of ver. 35 (q.v.)."

This is another instance where the infinitive can be rendered by a passive, but again, I would argue, that's because it's awkward (impossible) for us in English to use an active infinitive without supplying a subject.
Lünemann wrote:the infinitive active expresses the verbal idea in a vague generality, entirely free from any personal reference (p118; the italics are his).
However, what he means by this is not that the expression that includes the infinitive is gnomic or passionless or, with regard to its context, without personal reference. Consider another example:
Euripides, Iphigenia in Aulis, line 318 wrote: Μενέλαος
οὑμὸς οὐχ ὁ τοῦδε μῦθος κυριώτερος λέγειν.
My tale, not his, has the better right to be spoken. (Coleridge)
Yes, this is not the same as "I should speak first," though in context there's little doubt that Menelaus has in mind that he should have priority in speaking. (And so, Walker: "Before this man is heard I have the right to speak.") Perhaps we could render, "Mine is the speech that should go first." The real force of this active infinitive without an expressed subject is that the subject is deprived of all air of prominence; more than that, it is not that the subject is hidden from view, it simply isn't part of what the author communicates. When Lünemann speaks of the verbal idea being "entirely free from any personal reference", that's all he means: that the form of the expression has suppressed the subject. Yes, we can translate with a passive, as Coleridge does, and so include this with that class of active infinitives which may be translated as a passive, but the key aspect is - as with those examples that I supplied and, I would argue, with 1 Thessalonians 4v9 - the subject of the infinitive isn't the point of the communication.

I think Carl's response was spot on.
The translations supplying "anyone" may be doing so simply to satisfy the requirements of intelligible English. It seems to me that the force of the Greek (in the critical text) is "You people don't need writing to -- not you!" The emphasis is not on who should write to the Thessalonian congregation but on the qualification of the Thessalonians themselves. If we feel the need to supply a subject for γράφειν, it might as well be "Tom, Dick, or Harry"; the emphasis is on who's being written to, certainly not on who's doing the writing.
What do you think, Tony?

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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by Tony Pope »

I am very grateful, Alex, for your observations and further clarification, which are most illuminating. As Stephen had posed the question I was looking in commentaries on 1 Thess 4.9 in particular, to see what had been said other than by BDF. I was impressed by the claims that an active infinitive could be used where we would expect a passive in English, but I was struggling to understand whether Lünemann had a valid alternative view, hence my question.

It looks as though in 1 Thess 4.9 Lünemann decided it was absolutely clear who was the notional subject of the infinitive, i.e. Paul and company (and only them), and on that unsound basis concluded that ἔχετε was wrong.

Now I am wondering if in 1 Thess. 5.1, where we have a comparable thought expressed, why we have a passive infinitive:

Περὶ δὲ τῶν χρόνων καὶ τῶν καιρῶν, ἀδελφοί, οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ὑμῖν γράφεσθαι,

Is οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ὑμῖν γράφεσθαι simply an alternative way of expressing precisely the same meaning as in 4.9? Stephen has reminded us that “we lack the benefit of the previous correspondence from the Thessalonians to Paul” and maybe something in their wording caused Paul to express himself differently in 5.2 from 4.9. Or is there a different explanation?
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Re: Subject of γράφειν in 1 Thess 4:9?

Post by David Lim »

Tony Pope wrote:Now I am wondering if in 1 Thess. 5.1, where we have a comparable thought expressed, why we have a passive infinitive:

Περὶ δὲ τῶν χρόνων καὶ τῶν καιρῶν, ἀδελφοί, οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ὑμῖν γράφεσθαι,

Is οὐ χρείαν ἔχετε ὑμῖν γράφεσθαι simply an alternative way of expressing precisely the same meaning as in 4.9? Stephen has reminded us that “we lack the benefit of the previous correspondence from the Thessalonians to Paul” and maybe something in their wording caused Paul to express himself differently in 5.2 from 4.9. Or is there a different explanation?
This is just my opinion, but I think the infinitive is behaving more like in an accusative-infinitive construction, in which case the subject is completely dependent on the context if not explicitly stated. In 1 Thes 4:9 they do not have need for one to write to them, focusing on the action of writing itself. In 1 Thes 5:1 they do not have any need to be written to, focusing on them, who already know the times and seasons and thus do not need to be told about them. So I would say the meaning is exactly the same, but the focus is possibly slightly different.
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