>I have a question about the present participle blepwn.
>
>In Matt 5:28 Jesus speaks about an individual who looks at a woman to lust.
>
>"PAS O BLEPWN GUNAIKA PROS TO EPIQUMeSAI AUTHeN eDe EMOIXEUSEN AUTeN EN Te
>KARDIA AUTOU."
>
>Is there any exegetical significance to the present tense (ex. the one who
>is continually looking at a woman to lust). Or is this just a general
>present participle denoting a certain class of people.
>
>Is there the idea here of repeated action, thus the looking is tending
>toward a habitual sinful pattern?
Notice Tom, that BLEPWN is preceded by PAS and the article O, which makes
it a Substantival participle; in general substantival participles, esp.,
those with PAS, are simply noun substitutes and if there is any "aspect"
to them at all, its that the presents are generic and the aorists specific
(cf., my earlier post about imperatives). Interestingly enough, Wallace
deals with this specific passage in his new Syntax (pp. 615f.), and as he
points out there, if this instance is to be understood in some sort of
continual/repeated sense, then you'd probably have to do the same thing
with statement in v.32 PAS O APOLUWN, but it seems unlikely that this
guy KEEPS ON divorcing his wife...
***********************************************************************
Dale M. Wheeler, Th.D.
Research Professor in Biblical Languages Multnomah Bible College
8435 NE Glisan Street Portland, OR 97220
Voice: 503-251-6416 FAX:503-254-1268 E-Mail: dalemw@teleport.com
***********************************************************************