[B-Greek] 2 Thess. 2:6-7--two proposals
Webb
webb at selftest.net
Thu Mar 1 18:23:22 EST 2007
Dear Carl,
You gave EGEIRW as an example of a verb that can sometimes be construed as
either middle or passive. But the difference between EGEIRW and GINOMAI is
that EGEIRW can be transitive, and GINOMAI cannot. HGERQH EK MESOU could
mean either "got up out of the middle" or "was lifted out from the middle".
Unless there was absolutely no other way the sentence could make sense, I
can't see a reason to express GINOMAI EK MESOU as something beyond (1) "gets
out of the way" or (2) "gets [under his own power] out of the situation".
And I think each of those readings makes good sense in and of itself in 2
Thess. 2:7. For example, looking at option (1):
The lawless one is going to appear at some future point. There's only
(MONOS) one thing holding him back: the restrainer (hO KATECWN), who, at
some future point, will presumably stop restraining, and at which point the
lawless one will appear. I reckon that the idea of "to stop restraining" can
be expressed equally well as "to get out of the way" (GINOMAI EK MESOU).
What's wrong with that? Particularly in view of the fact that the writer
personalizes the restrainer by calling him hO KATECWN, not just TO KATECON,
the presumption is that this personal force has the option of restraining so
long, and then stopping. If "until he gets out of the way" sounds like an
unlikely rendering of ARTI hEWS EK MESOU GENHTAI, I'd like to hear your
reason for thinking so. Otherwise I can't see what would induce me to
imagine another implied actor, who has the supposed role of removing the
restrainer from the place where he metaphorically stands restraining.
On the assumption that you've encountered the verb GINOMAI in tens of
thousands of instances, I accept your statement it's not out of the question
that GINOMAI can occasionally carry have an implicit passive sense. So once
again, the question I'd have is, wouldn't that be the last option, in the
case that a middle sense, "action performed by the subject and involving the
subject", didn't seem possible?
Webb Mealy
-----Original Message-----
From: Carl W. Conrad [mailto:cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu]
Sent: Thursday, March 01, 2007 2:01 PM
To: Webb
Cc: 'B-Greek'
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] 2 Thess. 2:6-7--two proposals
On Mar 1, 2007, at 3:02 PM, Webb wrote:
>
> Dear Oun,
> 1. Difference btw active vs passive -- may it have something to do
> with the nature of 'middle' in Gk?
What it really has to do with is the fact that the forms labeled
middle-passive and passive (QH) all, when intransitive, bear the
sense "enter into state X." The nearest English equivalent is "get" +
predicate word (which may be a participle): GINOMAI is the
quintessential middle-passive verb that can quite readily be
Englished (usually) as "get" or "come to be" with a predicate word.
> Not to me, it doesn't. It has to do with my understanding that
> GINOMAI is
> strictly an intransitive verb. It never EVER takes an object. If a
> verb
> can't take an object, you can't turn it into a passive. In English,
> for
> example, the verb "to be" doesn't take an object. Like GINOMAI, it
> can take
> a predicate nominative or a predicate adjective and whatnot, but it
> can't
> take an object. If a verb (let's say X is a verb) is capable of being
> transitive, then it is capable of taking an object. "I X this
> thing." For
> the most part, that also means that I can use the object as the
> subject, and
> throw the verb into the passive voice to express an equivalent
> statement:
> "This thing is Xed by me". But you can't say "I am ammed". There is no
> passive voice for the verb "to be", or for any strictly
> intransitive verb.
> So in 2 Thess. 2:7, whatever GENHTAI means, it can't mean that
> something
> else acts on the subject of the verb. Whatever action there is, is
> carried
> out by the subject. From my limited knowledge of Greek, ARTI hEWS
> EK MESOU
> GENHTAI can't possibly mean "until he is taken out of the
> way" (pace KJV,
> NASB, NIV, NCV, NRSV, TEV).
Of course GENHTAI can't mean that something else acts on the subject
of the verb -- but that may be implicit as it is always implicit in a
MP form: GINETAI EK MESOU means "gets to be out-of-the-way, out-of-
the-scene, off-the-table, out-of-this-world, out-of-this-life." Just
as EGEIRETAI means "enters into a waking (or upright) state" it is
open to interpretation as "awakes" or "gets awakened." While I think
one ought to understand this ambivalence of the Greek MP form, I
don't really have any objection to understanding EK MESOU GINETAI as
"gets removed" (passive) or "gets out of the way" (intransitive/
ergative: the subject may simply leave the center of action or he/she
may be forcibly removed by an external agent.
I have no quarrel with BDAG's entry on this passage.
BDAG, s.v. GINOMAI: EK T. OURANWN G.
6. to make a change of location in space, move
b. EK TINOS (Job 28:2): γ. EK MESOU be removed, Lat. e medio tolli
(cp. Ps.-Aeschin., Ep. 12, 6 EK MESOU GENOMENWN EKEINWN; Plut.,
Timol. 238 [5, 3]; Achilles Tat. 2, 27, 2) 2 Th 2:7 (HFulford, ET 23,
1912, 40f: 'leave the scene'). Of a voice fr. heaven: EK T.
OURANWN G. sound forth fr. heaven (2 Macc 2:21; cp. Da 4:31 Theod.)
Mk 1:11; Lk 3:22; 9:35; cp. vs. 36.
> 2. It should be 'And now you know what's ~ ', not 'And you know
> what's now
> ~'
> I've got a lot of translations in front of me, including Lattimore,
> who is
> not particularly influenced by the English bible translation
> tradition. No
> one them takes NUN with OIDATE. I'm inclined to trust them on this.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad2 at mac.com
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
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