[B-Greek] Force of periphrastic construction?

Harold Holmyard hholmyard3 at earthlink.net
Fri Mar 30 16:25:28 EDT 2007


Hi Pete,
> Can anyone help me with this? I've just started Mounces Graded reader,
> (Having just completed Dobson's NT greek, and A SummerGreek reader by
> self study), and I'm not sure of the answer to these questions:
>
> ------------------
> 1 John 1:4 -
>
> What is the force of a periphrastic construction?
> Does context support giving this periphrastic construction it's historical
> force?
>
> I found the following quotes:
>
> First, regarding semantics, in classical Greek this construction was used to
> highlight aspectual force. By the Hellenistic era, and particularly in the
> NT, such emphasis is often, if not usually,lost. (Wallace)
>   

HH: If you have Wallace, why don't you look at his other examples of the 
perfect periphrastic on p. 649 of Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics. If 
you don't have that book, see Lk 12:6; 2 Cor 4:3; and Eph 2:8. He treats 
them all as perfect passives. In 1 John 1:4 that would suggest a 
translation like "may be made complete."
> Originally it stressed the linear aspect of the verb. (Mounce)
>
> Does this mean that originally (i.e. in classical greek) a periphrastic
> construction transformed the aspect of
> a perfect participle to progressive rather than perfective-stative. I.e.
> that the action is still going
> on (our joy is being made complete), rather than the action has occurred
> bringing about the resultant
> state (our joy is complete – because we have written this).
>   

HH: In English a verbal phrase can be perfective and progressive: "I 
have been lying in the hammock." So perhaps it could be in Greek, too, 
but I accept that the linear force has lost its emphasis by NT times, 
mainly because that's what I've been told.
> What about context?
>
> Does the fact that GRAFOMEN is present tense, support the notion that in
> this case the pc
> should have a progressive aspect. (we are writing these things so that our
> joy will be made complete)
>   

HH: I think that's the correct translation. I do not see any 
particularly progressive aspect in the way you have rendered it.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard





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