Re: Luke 2:14: en uyistois qew, en anqrwpois eudokias

Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Wed, 20 Nov 1996 06:15:55 -0600

At 5:49 AM -0600 11/20/96, Jonathan Robie wrote:
>OK, I thought I could parse this, and then someone pointed out that UYISTOIS
>is plural. Why plural?
>
>Luke 2:14 (GNT) doxa en uyistois qew kai epi ghs eirhnh en anqrwpois
>eudokias.
>
>Nothing seems to agree with it. DOXA is singular. QEW is singular. GHS is
>singular. ANQRWPOIS is plural, but masculine. And this is Luke, who is
>supposed to write good Greek.
>
>Any hints?

Here's a couple stabs at it:

(1) It's a neuter plural generalizing phrase, of a sort well-exemplified
elsewhere in the NT: TA EPOURANIA, TA EPIGAIA.

(2) Semitic (Hebrew at least) has a plural (dual?) for Heaven: ha
Shamayim,which seems to be represented at some points in the NT with the
plural hOI OURANOI.

There may be five or six other reasons too. Maybe they will rise to
consciousness and come back to us. ;-)

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO, USA 63130
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/