Dear Harold,Rolf, thank you for this interesting example, because it has led me to reconsider the idea of the "prophetic perfect", which we have discussed before on this list. Now here we have what looks like an example in Greek of the same phenomenon. In this case, Jude 14, the Greek example is, I understand, taken from a quotation from the book of Enoch, and so is a translation of a Hebrew original. Rolf, of course you know a lot more about this book than I do and can perhaps tell us what verb form was used in the original. But I note that this example is taken from what I take to be an apocalyptic vision of the future, Enoch (I think), relating a vision which he saw. He is telling the vision as something he saw in the past, although in fact he understands it (as does Jude) as a prophecy of something which will happen in the future.
In the study of a dead language we can never draw a conclusion and believe that this is the final word, this is the truth. But by the use of different approaches we can try to come as close the the correct understanding as possible. I have also applied my model to New Testament Greek, although I have not yet analysed all the verbs of the NT. You are correct in your observations that the aorist may have non-pastreference - it can even has future reference (e.g., Jude 1:14). My conclusion so far is that past tense is not a part of the aorist, but it represents the perfective aspect. I take the imperfect as as past tense + the imperfective aspect, present as the imperfective aspect, and future as future tense.
Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.