Several years ago I read an article that tried to argue that
the AND made a difference in terms of whether men and women were
equal (the argument, made from a feminist point of view, was that
the AND indicated a closer degree of equality). But it seems to me
that this is a straightforward quotation from Gen 1.27.
Hence, something like
Here there is no Jew or Greek, here there is no slave or free,
here there is no "male and female".
Regards,
j.v.
> From owner-b-greek@virginia.edu Fri Feb 14 23:18:31 1997
> Date: Fri, 14 Feb 1997 21:57:08 -0600
> From: Eric Weiss <eweiss@gte.net>
> Reply-To: eweiss@gte.net
> Organization: Home
> To: Biblical Greek List <b-greek@virginia.edu>
> Subject: Galatians 3:28 ARSEN KAI QHLU
>
> I may have asked this one time in the past, but the B-Greek archives
> aren't currently searchable.
>
> Just about every translation I've consulted insists on translating
> Galatians 3:28 as "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither
> slave nor free, there is neither male NOR female...." Yet the Greek has
> KAI between ARSEN and QULH, i.e., "...there is not male AND female...."
>
> Despite reading that the standard Jewish prayer book supposedly has a
> prayer thanking God for not making [the Jewish man] "a gentile, a slave,
> or a woman" - hence implying that Paul was addressing that here
> (assuming the prayer was used in the first century), I view this as a
> clear allusion (exact quote, in fact) to Genesis 1:27 LXX - in line with
> Paul's view that in Christ Jesus a new creation had been brought about.
> (In the old creation God made HA-ADAM/TON ANQRWPON "male and female,"
> whereas the new creation - the One New Man - is Christ.) I have several
> books on the New Testament view of women, yet only one of them (GOD'S
> IDEAL WOMAN by Pape, IVP) addresses this, but only as a brief comment,
> and otherwise consistently translates the phrase "male [n]or female."
>
> I lack commentaries on Galatians so I can't check this out further
> without a library. Does anyone out there also see a reference to Genesis
> 1:27 in Paul's use of KAI here? Or is it a policy of Greek grammar to
> end a string of OUK...OUDE OUK...OUDE pairs by joining the final pair
> with KAI but meaning the same as OUDE (i.e., "[n]or") - which would
> justify the way everyone seems to want to translate this verse?
>
> --
> "Eric S. Weiss"
> http://home1.gte.net/eweiss/index.htm
>