I think that the Greek is quite unambiguous about this: the ones who arose
from the dead are the same ones who went into the holy city. The verb that
the KJV translates "came out" is a participle, and the main verb associated
with this participle is "went into". Let me try a hyper-literal translation:
Matt 27:52 And the graves were opened, and many bodies of the
having-fallen-asleep saints arose, (53) and going out from the graves after
the resurrection of them, they went into the holy city and appeared to many.
Now let me loosen this up a little:
Matt 27:52 And the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had
fallen asleep arose, and going out from the graves after their resurrection,
they went into the holy city and appeared to many.
It was definitely the resurrected saints who did this. A few interesting
points of the Greek: (1) "Arose" is another one of those medio-passive verbs
- Gramcord markes it as passive "were raised", but it also appears in other
contexts with middle force, e.g. where Jesus rose from the table. Either
would make sense, but I think that the middle sense is more likely,
following Carl's guidelines for interpretation of medio-passives. (2)
"Appeared" seems like another medio-passive verb - it is also marked as
passive in my Gramcord database "were revealed", but I also interpret this
one as middle.
What do the rest of you think?
Jonathan
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Jonathan Robie jwrobie@mindspring.com http://www.mindspring.com/~jwrobie
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