It's safe to say here that POREUQENTES represents what
an English-thinker writing Greek would have written as POREUQHTE OUN KAI
MAQHTEUQHTE PANTA TA EQNH. So call it imperatival insofar as it is
functioning as the first element in a sequence with the imperative.
Excuse my ignorance but I am just not convinced that it is as easy as that.
Couldn't the participle be linked with the other participles rather than
the imperative. Is it wrong to translate this as "As you go, disciple all
peoples..." This would mean that going, baptising and teaching were
ongoing events whilst the discipling was a one off?
I fear that I am going to get a lecture on aspect here. But so what, I
need to be taught!
Pete Phillips
----------
From: Carl W. Conrad [SMTP:cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu]
Sent: 27 October 1997 21:04
To: Thomas Bond
Cc: B-GREEK@virginia.edu
Subject: Re: Mt 28:19a POREUQENTES
At 1:02 PM -0600 10/27/97, Thomas Bond wrote:
>I am a new subscriber to this list, and am sure that my question is as old
>as my subscription is new. But, I am curious about the use of the
>participle in Mt. 28:19a: POREUQENTES OUN MAQHTEUSATE PANTA TA EQNH. Is
>this an imperative use of the participle? Or, is it a temporal use of the
>participle? It seems clear to me that the participles following, in vs.
>19b, 20 -- BAPTIZONTES and DIDASKONTES -- are modal participles.
Here POREUQENTES is clearly subordinated to the imperative MAQHTEUSATE;
from a very early period Greek tended to subordinate verbs which in English
were part of a string of parallels and formulate those earlier in sequence
as participles (usually aorist, as here) and then leave the last in the
appropriate format. It's safe to say here that POREUQENTES represents what
an English-thinker writing Greek would have written as POREUQHTE OUN KAI
MAQHTEUQHTE PANTA TA EQNH. So call it imperatival insofar as it is
functioning as the first element in a sequence with the imperative.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad@yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/