[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]
b-greek-digest V1 #548
b-greek-digest Thursday, 19 January 1995 Volume 01 : Number 548
In this issue:
Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Re: Entry level Greek texts
eph. 2:8-9
Re: Eph. 2:8-99
Re: eph. 2:8-9
Re: Camel or rope?
Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Re: eph. 2:8-9
Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Re: Camel or rope?
Matt 19:24
Books on stylometry
Henry Planck
Re: Camel or rope?
Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Pastoral epistles inquiry/lexical statistics
2 Peter 3:9
2 Peter 3:9
Re: Camel or rope?
Re: eph. 2:8-9
Re: Camel or rope?
Re: eph. 2:8-9
Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Dvdmoore@aol.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 01:45:14 -0500
Subject: Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
scc@reston.icl.com (Stephen Carlson) wrote:
>My own lexicostatistical studies seem to show close affinities
>(a) among all the Pastorals, (b) between the two Thessalonians, (c)
>between Colossians and Ephesians, (d) among the Johannine epistles
>and with John, (e) a lack of contacts between Revelation and the other
>Johannine literature, and (f) the existence of a Synoptic Problem.
>2 Timothy does indeed show somewhat greater lexical contacts with the
>Pauline corpus than either of the other Pastorals, and Yule's
>Characteristic supports this as well.
One of the possible reasons for the difference in language between the
Pastorals and the rest of the Pauline corpus could be that the former are
sent to Paul's coleagues in ministry and not, primarily, to the congregations
they were pastoring. Paul's other letters are to the congregations. Those
of us who are pastors know that the language and vocabulary we use among our
peers (more or less { :-) ) here on the list might not always be readily
understood if we used them in messages to our congregations. So we adjust
our modes of speech and vocabulary to the situation. Any of us, in fact,
adjusts his or her language in different situations: at times, perhaps
somewhat unconsciously. The use of larger words (5.5 letters average) in the
Pastorals as opposed to vocabulary of shorter words in the other Paulines
(4.82 letters average) would fit with some such reason for the differences in
vocabulary in general (J. N. D. Kelly, _The Pastoral Epistles_, p.23 cites
the word-length figures given above.).
David L. Moore
------------------------------
From: zamora@vnet.ibm.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 08:42:22 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Re: Entry level Greek texts
dturner@cornerstone.edu wrote,
>
> I've been unsubscribed for about a month so please bear with me if this area
> has been discussed recently...
>
> One of our alumna is pursuing a D.Min. in church education at another
> institution. She is required to establish basic competence in Greek, which
> seems to mean that she must know the alphabet, pronunciation, basic
> terminology and tools, etc., so that she can do NT research with some basic
> skills. It seems to me that using a standard Greek elements text like
> Mounce which I am currently using in the classroom would be a bit of an
> overkill with her. Do any of you know of resources designed for this type of
> person? I seem to remember a book by Goodrick called _Do it yourself Hebrew
> and Greek_ which might fit but I'm not familiar with it and I suspect it's
> out of print.
>
> Any suggestions would be appreciated, perhaps off-list would be best. Thanks.
I am also interested in the answers to this. My wife and I are
beginning to learn Greek; we aren't under the time constraints that
the student Prof. Turner's speaks of is under, so that may change the
books that would be best for us. We are interested in (eventually)
being able to read the LXX, the NT, and the writings of the Greek
fathers and are unsure about the differences in the Greek (i.e. is the
LXX in Attic Greek, Koine, or some intermediate dialect). What would
be good sources (introductory texts, grammars, and dictionaries) for us?
Also, Prof. Turner, could you forward to me any replies you get
through private e-mail?
Thanks,
Tony
zamora@vnet.ibm.com
------------------------------
From: Bill Kelley <bkelley@teleport.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 06:13:47 -0800
Subject: eph. 2:8-9
A lot of ink as been spilled over the phrase "through faith, and that not
of yourselves... ."
Is there any compelling reason why this phrase can't be translated "through
faithfulness... ? Any comments appreciated
------------------------------
From: George Ramsey <gramsey@cs1.presby.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 10:26:29 -0400 (EST)
Subject: Re: Eph. 2:8-99
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Bill Kelley wrote:
> A lot of ink as been spilled over the phrase "through faith, and that not
> of yourselves... ."
> Is there any compelling reason why this phrase can't be translated "through
> faithfulness... ? Any comments appreciated
>
Bill,
"Faithfulness" implies works which ARE "of oneself," i.e., efforts
generated by the individual. In
the context of Ephesians 2:8-9, the author is stressing that faith is
always a gift from God. An individual does not generate his/her own
faith anymore than one generates his/her own love (we "fall" in love, on
a human level) for others. (Cf. "We love because he first loved us.")
Having said that, we should also be cognizant of the note struck
in James, that "faith without works (i.e., faithfulness) is dead."
Interestingly, whereas the New Testament treats Abraham as the
epitome of faith (Romans 4, Galatians 3), the Jewish tradition celebrates
Abraham as the epitome of faithfulness. James realized that you don't
have one without the other.
George W. Ramsey
------------------------------
From: Travis Bauer <bauer@acc.jc.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 09:26:00 -36000
Subject: Re: eph. 2:8-9
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Bill Kelley wrote:
> A lot of ink as been spilled over the phrase "through faith, and that not
> of yourselves... ."
> Is there any compelling reason why this phrase can't be translated "through
> faithfulness... ? Any comments appreciated
>
>
Before looking at the Greek text, I'm wondering if we could
define your proposed English translations, so we agree on what the
difference between faith and faithfullness is.
IMHO, the term faith is somewhat less defined than faithfulness. Faith can
mean a faith that I generate. I have decided to have faith in my wife,
for example. I have decided to trust her. The other way faith can be
understood is the something given. God creates faith in us apart from
anything we do.
Faithfullness, I think, is really more defined, and belongs to the former
definition, that is, faith that I generate or decide upon. In the
definition of pistis, BAGD puts faithfulness and reliability together.
If I understand this English distinction correctly, and it is possible
that I don't, I think we are looking at a Theological rather than a
textual distinction. How one defines "faith" is going to determine whether
or not one can use "faithfulness" in this passage.
Assuming the distinctions between the terms made so far, I'd like to
propose that faithfulness is not an appropriate translation because of
the phrase immediately following, "that no one may boast." If I am
faithful, that is, have generated my own reliability, I would have a
reason to boast.
Travis Bauer
Jamestown College
------------------------------
From: Bruce Terry <terry@bible.acu.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 10:42:54 CST
Subject: Re: Camel or rope?
On Jan. 18, Carl Conrad wrote:
>If one assumes Marcan priority, it should be noted that Matthew and Luke
>both derive this text from Mark (10.25), and there is no such variant
>indicated in the critical apparatus for the Marcan verse.
Carl--
Just to muddy the waters on a good answer, Aland's synopsis lists the variant
as occuring in Mark 10:25 in MSS 13 and 28 as well as the Georgian translation.
- --Bruce
********************************************************************************
Bruce Terry E-MAIL: terry@bible.acu.edu
Box 8426, ACU Station Phone: 915/674-3759
Abilene, Texas 79699 Fax: 915/674-3769
********************************************************************************
------------------------------
From: Stephen Carlson <scc@reston.icl.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 11:26:27 EST
Subject: Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Bruce Terry wrote:
> On Jan. 18th, Stephen Carlson wrote giving the Yule's Characteristic for 3 John
> (2.58), 2 John (2.93), and 1 John (4.40). In that post he stated:
>
> >I'm not sure what conclusions can be drawn, but Yule's Characteristic
> >is supposed to be constant for the same author over time and over
> >different genres.
> >
> >My own lexicostatistical studies seem to show close affinities
> > (d) among the Johannine epistles and with John
>
> Stephen--
>
> If percentages of 2.58 and 4.40 show close affinities, I'm having trouble
> seeing that Yule's Characteristic shows anything about authorship. Those
> figures strike me as rather diverse. Have you left something out or am I just
> missing something?
Perhaps I wasn't clear. "My own lexicostatistical studies" refer to
different statistitics than Yule's Characteristic. I'm still reading
the literature to see how probative these statistics are for authorship.
Here's an excerpt from one of my charts:
*******************************************************************************
Lexical Contacts -- Order 3
Bk Tot Mt La(lk ac) Qq Sy(mk) Jn(Je jn) Pp(Pc Pe Pa) hb jm Pt(p1 p2) jd Jr(rv)
j1 286 4 12( 5 5) 2 5( 3) 46( 3 42) 20(14 4 1) 1 1 1( 1 .) 1 8( 6)
j2 57 2 9( 7 2) 9( 7) 53(26 26) 25(14 7 2) 2( 2) 2( 2)
j3 32 3 13( 6 6) 3 6( 3) 41(22 19) 31(22 6 3) 3( 3) ( )
rv 736 14 26(13 11) 5 17( 8) 15( 2 13) 15(10 3 1) 4 2 1( 1 .) . ( )
pm 49 4( 4 ) 4( 2) 8( 4 4) 84(43 29 2) ( ) ( )
*******************************************************************************
Explanation: A third order lexical contact is a string of three
words in their lexical form that is exclusively shared between
two corpora. The intuition behind this is that just as authors
tend to select certain vocabulary, they would also tend to the
same combinations of words as well. Higher order lexical
contacts (like ten-word phrases) usually shows a literary
dependency (either on a common source, such as the LXX, or on
each other), but such effects seem to be swamped out at the
third order.
Here, on the chart, 3 John ("j3") has a total of 32 of these
contacts, of which 3% are found in Matthew. Because the sharing
must be exclusive, the figures for Matthew and Luke tend to be
for the 'M' and 'L' material respectively. Since 'Q' material
would be present in both Mt and Lk, it does not show up in the
Mt and Lk corpora, so I created an additional corpus called Qq,
which indicates an exclusive contact with *both* Mt and Lk. We
see for 3 John that is about 3% (i.e. 1).
The symbols for the other corpora on the top line are La =
Luke-Acts, Sy = Synoptics, Je = Johannine Epistles, Jn =
Johannine (Epistles and Gospel) Pp = all Paulines, Pc = Core
Paulines (Rom, 1Cor, 2Cor, Gal, Php, 1Th, Phm), Pe = Pauline
Epistles (plus 2Th, Eph, Col), Pa = Pastorals (1Ti, 2Ti, Tit),
Jr = Johannine-Revelation.
Here we see that about half of all the 3rd order lexical
contacts of the Johannine Epistles are with other Johannine
Literature. No other book shows a similar signature. For
comparison, Revelation does not show a marked preference for any
other corpus; and even a letter as small as Philemon shows a
marked preference for the Pauline corpus.
Stephen Carlson
- --
Stephen Carlson : Poetry speaks of aspirations, : ICL, Inc.
scc@reston.icl.com : and songs chant the words. : 11490 Commerce Park Dr.
(703) 648-3330 : Shujing 2:35 : Reston, VA 22091 USA
------------------------------
From: BBezdek@aol.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 12:50:34 -0500
Subject: Re: eph. 2:8-9
It can, and I beleive it should be translated "faithfulness" In most cases I
think the faith works argument would be resolved if "pistis". were rendered
"faithfulness" which, I think more correctly conveys the meaning of the
writer.
Byron T. Bezdek
------------------------------
From: Stephen Carlson <scc@reston.icl.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 12:14:06 EST
Subject: Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Dvdmoore@aol.com wrote:
> scc@reston.icl.com (Stephen Carlson) wrote:
>
> >My own lexicostatistical studies seem to show close affinities
> >(a) among all the Pastorals, (b) between the two Thessalonians, (c)
> >between Colossians and Ephesians, (d) among the Johannine epistles
> >and with John, (e) a lack of contacts between Revelation and the other
> >Johannine literature, and (f) the existence of a Synoptic Problem.
>
> >2 Timothy does indeed show somewhat greater lexical contacts with the
> >Pauline corpus than either of the other Pastorals, and Yule's
> >Characteristic supports this as well.
>
> One of the possible reasons for the difference in language between the
> Pastorals and the rest of the Pauline corpus could be that the former are
> sent to Paul's coleagues in ministry and not, primarily, to the congregations
> they were pastoring. Paul's other letters are to the congregations.
[* * *]
> Any of us, in fact,
> adjusts his or her language in different situations: at times, perhaps
> somewhat unconsciously.
Yes, it seems that most of the exclusively shared vocabulary
found in the Pastorals is of this type. Consider words like:
AMAXOS, not contentious (1Tm3:3 Tt3:2); AISXROKERDHS, greedy for
money (1Tm3:3 Tt1:7); DIAGW, lead a life (1Tm2:2 Tt3:3);
EUSEBWS, godly (2Tm3:12 Tt2:12); WFELIMOS, profitable (1Tm4:18
2Tm3:16 Tt3:8); etc. Titus does have some words only found in
other Paulines, such as ANAKAINWSIS, renewing (Rm12:2 Tt3:5);
and KERDOS, gain (Pp1:21 3:7 Tt1:11). A full report for Titus
(the shortest report of the Pastorals) is attached.
> The use of larger words (5.5 letters average) in the
> Pastorals as opposed to vocabulary of shorter words in the other Paulines
> (4.82 letters average) would fit with some such reason for the differences in
> vocabulary in general (J. N. D. Kelly, _The Pastoral Epistles_, p.23 cites
> the word-length figures given above.).
I'll have to check out this stat, but I don't know how useful it is for
investigating authorship.
Stephen Carlson
**********************************************************************
Lexical Contacts -- Order 1 tt (Titus)
SYNOPTICS
tt-mt PALIGGENESI/A
tt-ac FILANQRWPI/A
tt-ac KRH/S
tt-ac KRH/TH
tt-ac NOSFI/ZW
tt-ac PEIQARXE/W
tt-La E)PIFAI/NW
tt-Qq NOMIKO/S
JOHANNINES
PAULINES
tt-rm A)NAKAI/NWSIS
tt-c2 A)POTO/MWS
tt-pp KE/RDOS
tt-ep LOUTRO/N
tt-Pe AI)SXRO/S
tt-Pe NOUQESI/A
tt-Pe XRHSTO/THS
tt-t1 A)/MAXOS
tt-t1 AI)SXROKERDH/S
tt-t1 DIA/GW
tt-t1 DIABEBAIO/OMAI
tt-t1 GENEALOGI/A
tt-t1 NHFA/LIOS
tt-t1 PA/ROINOS
tt-t1 PLH/KTHS
tt-t1 SEMNO/THS
tt-t1 SW/FRWN
tt-t2 EU)SEBW=S
tt-Pa W)FE/LIMOS
tt-Pp A)NE/GKLHTOS
tt-Pp E)/RIS
tt-Pp E)PIFA/NEIA
tt-Pp E)PITAGH/
tt-Pp GNH/SIOS
tt-Pp PROI+/STHMI
tt-Pp SEMNO/S
tt-Pp TI/TOS
CATHOLICS
tt-hb A)NWFELH/S
tt-hb KOSMIKO/S
tt-p2 AU)QA/DHS
**********************************************************************
- --
Stephen Carlson : Poetry speaks of aspirations, : ICL, Inc.
scc@reston.icl.com : and songs chant the words. : 11490 Commerce Park Dr.
(703) 648-3330 : Shujing 2:35 : Reston, VA 22091 USA
------------------------------
From: Carl W Conrad <cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 12:16:35 -0600 (CST)
Subject: Re: Camel or rope?
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Bruce Terry wrote:
> On Jan. 18, Carl Conrad wrote:
> >If one assumes Marcan priority, it should be noted that Matthew and Luke
> >both derive this text from Mark (10.25), and there is no such variant
> >indicated in the critical apparatus for the Marcan verse.
> Carl--
> Just to muddy the waters on a good answer, Aland's synopsis lists the variant
> as occuring in Mark 10:25 in MSS 13 and 28 as well as the Georgian translation.
Tell me something about the Georgian translation, anyone? The MSS cited
are minuscules and wouldn't seem to have much weight over against
consistent testimony of the uncials. Checking Aland's apparatus, I find
exactly what you cite, Bruce; yesterday I was looking at the UBS text,
which doesn't list the variant in Mark, although it does in Matthew and
Luke.
By the way, it now occurs to me that there was discussion of this same
question two or three years back when I first got on the list.
Unfortunately there's no archive, but I might see if I can find my logs
from those days--there's nothing like "light from the past!"
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
------------------------------
From: Gibbsmw@aol.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 13:31:57 -0500
Subject: Matt 19:24
Arlen,
In response to your question regarding the use of kamelon and kamilon in
Matt. 19:24, a Greek professor whom I highly respect says, "Anything is
possible, but how probable is it?"
With respect to Matt's use of kamelon rather than kamilon, the Nestle-Aland
26 edition footnotes this textual variant with only a "pc." This (pc) means
pauci= "a few." The use of this symbol relieves the committee of having to
list all of the overwhelming evidence against the very few instances where
kamilon occurs. I realize that this is a very brief explanation, but you
might consult the introductory chapter of the Nestle-Aland 26 or 27 text, or
the UBS 3 or 4 text that will explain the weight given to textual evidence.
Sincerely,
Mark Gibbs (gibbsmw@aol.com)
------------------------------
From: D Mealand <ewnt05@castle.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 19 Jan 95 16:35:06 GMT
Subject: Books on stylometry
Just in case there are those who wish to find recent books on
stylometric analysis there are very recent works by K.Neumann
(Authenticity of Pauline...) by D.Williams on Josephus, by G.Ledger on Plato,
Older classic works on stylometry include Mosteller & Wallace on the
Federalist and Ellega@rd on the Junius Letters as well as A.Q.Morton's
book Literary Detection.
This is just a very quick and sketchy note from memory of some books since
1980 and some earlier ones since 1955.
[the @ above is an attempt to denote an a with an o over the top]
There are earlier stylometric studies going back to 1887.
David M.
**************************1/1995********************************************
David L. Mealand * E-mail: David.Mealand@ed.ac.uk
University of Edinburgh * Office Fax: (+44)-131-650-6579
Scotland, U.K. EH1 2LX * Office tel.:(+44)-131-650-8917 or 8921
------------------------------
From: Theojoe@aol.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 14:41:07 -0500
Subject: Henry Planck
Has anyone read Henry Plank _Commentatio de vera Natura atque Indole
Orationis Gracae Novi Testamenti_ (1810) or the English translation made by
Edward Robinson (American Biblical Repository, Andover, 1831)? I am
interested in observations on Planks philosophical/religious background and
any impact he might have had upon Cremer's _Biblico-Theological Lexicon of
the New Testament Greek_.
Thanks in advance,
Joe Abrahamson
Theojoe@aol.com
------------------------------
From: Bruce Terry <terry@bible.acu.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 14:44:36 CST
Subject: Re: Camel or rope?
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Carl Conrad wrote:
>Tell me something about the Georgian translation, anyone?
Carl--
Try Bruce Metzger's _The Early Versions of the New Testament_, pp. 182-214 for
more than you ever wanted to know about the Georgian version.
- --Bruce
********************************************************************************
Bruce Terry E-MAIL: terry@bible.acu.edu
Box 8426, ACU Station Phone: 915/674-3759
Abilene, Texas 79699 Fax: 915/674-3769
********************************************************************************
------------------------------
From: Bruce Terry <terry@bible.acu.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 14:56:33 CST
Subject: Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
Stephen--
Thanks for the clarification on your own lexicostatistical studies. Your third
order chart is worth archiving. You've done some interesting work.
- --Bruce
********************************************************************************
Bruce Terry E-MAIL: terry@bible.acu.edu
Box 8426, ACU Station Phone: 915/674-3759
Abilene, Texas 79699 Fax: 915/674-3769
********************************************************************************
------------------------------
From: Greg Doudna <gdoudna@ednet1.osl.or.gov>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 14:00:45 -0800
Subject: Pastoral epistles inquiry/lexical statistics
To Stephen Carlson:
Many thanks for the very interesting data on third order
[three-word string] lexical contacts!!
A method question: how do you quantify a four-word string
contact--as one or two third-order lexical contacts? On the
Johannine issue, are you able to provide a count for Rev 2-3
only (compared with the Johannine letters)? I would be most
curious on that (though if only a few contacts were found
in all of Rev I suppose no greater number would be found in
a subset of Rev, so my question answers itself...?)
Has this method been comparatively checked on other known
(i.e. recent and independently verified authorship) corpuses?
Intuitively, it seems very strong and fruitful as a method.
Would you be able to provide data on 2 Thessalonians (and
1 Thessalonians) compared to the rest of the Pauline
(particularly your pc 7 core Paulines) corpus? [Greedy,
aren't I? :-) ] And Philippians?
Greg Doudna
Marylhurst College
West Linn, Oregon
- --
------------------------------
From: "MADAVIDS.US.ORACLE.COM" <MADAVIDS@us.oracle.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 14:12:49 PST
Subject: 2 Peter 3:9
Hi -
I apologize in advance for not using the Greek but I am in the middle of an
argument and do not have a reference handy.
In 2 Peter 3:9 (NIV) Paul says:
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand
slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but
everyone to come to repentence.
The question is, who does 'you,' 'anyone' and 'everyone' refer to? Is 'you'
the addressees of the letter? Does that necessarily preclude 'everyone' from
meaning 'all the world?' (There it is again, those theological presuppositions
creeping in!) Are these translations straightforward?
I'm beginning to think I need a second Greek NT and lexicon to take to work...
Thanks -
Mary Ann Davidson
madavids@us.oracle.com
------------------------------
From: "MADAVIDS.US.ORACLE.COM" <MADAVIDS@us.oracle.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 14:21:04 PST
Subject: 2 Peter 3:9
Correction: 2nd pp. should have read 'in 2 Peter 3:9 PETER says:' DUHHHHH.
madavids.us.oracle.com
------------------------------
From: Vincent Broman <broman@np.nosc.mil>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 12:32:26 PST
Subject: Re: Camel or rope?
The Georgian version and 13 and 28, with a number of other witnesses,
have been characterized as "Caesarean". And although the Caesarean witnesses
are not really a "text type" (nor even well defined) they have enough
in common that the Markan variant might represent an early reading, not
just three random medieval variants.
Vincent Broman, code 572 Bayside Email: broman@nosc.mil
Naval Command Control and Ocean Surveillance Center, RDT&E Div.
San Diego, CA 92152-6147, USA Phone: +1 619 553 1641
------------------------------
From: Kenneth Litwak <kenneth@sybase.com>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 95 16:13:15 PST
Subject: Re: eph. 2:8-9
This is similar to the question of pistis ihsous Christou I think. For
that, you should check out an article in Novum Testamentum (can't remember
the exact title) on pistis I.Ch. in the CHurch Fathers, from 1994.
If I ws at home, I'd have the exact reference. The point of that article
is that faithfulness of CHrist, while technically possible, is wholly
unsupported by early Church writers. If you read the article, perhaps the
methodology of the author will help you if you want to do further analysis,
such as with TLG.
Ken Litwak
Emeryville, CA
------------------------------
From: Carl W Conrad <cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 18:30:26 -0600 (GMT-0600)
Subject: Re: Camel or rope?
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Vincent Broman wrote:
> The Georgian version and 13 and 28, with a number of other witnesses,
> have been characterized as "Caesarean". And although the Caesarean witnesses
> are not really a "text type" (nor even well defined) they have enough
> in common that the Markan variant might represent an early reading, not
> just three random medieval variants.
My thanks to you and to Bruce Terry, as well, for responding to my
question about the Georgian version. As I recall (if I recall rightly),
you have had things to say hitherto about the MS traditions. I wonder if
you have a judgment on the original question concerning the preferable
reading: KAMHLON or KAMILON, and the reason for the preference.
Meanwhile, I shall see if I can find that long-lost and short-lived
thread on this issue from two or more yearsa ago.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
------------------------------
From: Carl W Conrad <cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 18:42:14 -0600 (GMT-0600)
Subject: Re: eph. 2:8-9
On Thu, 19 Jan 1995, Kenneth Litwak wrote:
> This is similar to the question of pistis ihsous Christou I think. For
> that, you should check out an article in Novum Testamentum (can't remember
> the exact title) on pistis I.Ch. in the CHurch Fathers, from 1994.
> If I ws at home, I'd have the exact reference. The point of that article
> is that faithfulness of CHrist, while technically possible, is wholly
> unsupported by early Church writers. If you read the article, perhaps the
> methodology of the author will help you if you want to do further analysis,
> such as with TLG.
I don't want to choose up sides here on the question of which is the
better way to take PISTIS IHSOU XRISTOU, but I would not that Luke
Johnson presents a fine argument on behalf of the "subjective genitive"
reading of the Pauline phrase ("Christ's faithfulness to God is what
saves us.") It's in his chapter on Paul in his NT Introduction textbook.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
------------------------------
From: Dvdmoore@aol.com
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 19:50:56 -0500
Subject: Re: Pastoral epistles inquiry
To all:
The following is the first part of a post to Linguist-L from last
September. I thought it might be of interest re the present questions
concerning the Pastorals.
David Moore
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
** ** ** **
1)
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 09:50:14 -0400
From: "William J. Rapaport" <rapaport@cs.Buffalo.EDU>
Subject: comparing texts for authorship -- summary
Last June, I posted the following query about "comparing 2 texts":
A colleague in our Classics dept. wants to be able to compare 2 texts
to see if they were written by the same author, or by different authors.
Presumably, this would be done by some combination of a stylistic and a
statistical analysis.
(As I recall, this sort of technique has been used by folks who try to
figure out if Shakespeare really wrote Shakespeare's plays.)
What she needs are pointers to the literature, especially information
on how reliable such arguments are.
Appended is a summary of the replies. Thanks to all of you!
William J. Rapaport
Associate Professor of Computer Science
and
Center for Cognitive Science
Dept. of Computer Science | (716) 645-3180 x 112
SUNY Buffalo | fax: (716) 645-3464
Buffalo, NY 14260 | rapaport@cs.buffalo.edu
*************
Date: Fri, 3 Jun 1994 14:18:46 --100
From: Ken.Beesley@xerox.fr (Ken Beesley)
Some important work on authorship was done by Michaelson & Morton in
Edinburgh, Scotland.
The Rev. A.Q. Morton
The Abbey Manse
Culross
Dunfermline, Fife KY128JD
Newmills 880-231
Prof. S. Michaelson
Computer Science
JCMB
Kings Buildings
University of Edinburgh
Edinburgh, Scotland
There was also some work by a couple of statisticians at Brigham Young
University in Provo, Utah, USA. Their names escape me now.
*************
Date: Fri, 3 Jun 1994 13:24:12 -0500
From: hrubin@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
Probably the best sound work from a statistical basis is
Title: Inference and disputed authorship: The Federalist <by>
Frederick Mosteller <and> David L. Wallace.
Author(s): Mosteller, Frederick, 1916-
Wallace, David L. (David Lee), 1928-
Publisher: Reading, Mass., Addison-Wesley <1964>
This book considered the Federalist papers, written by three known
authors,
but different ones by different authors. One of their conclusions was
that
analysis by context vocabulary and other similar things, much used by
those
who assigned authorship in the past, did not work; the only thing which
did
for this problem was the use of connectives.
There is an article in the _Journal of Applied Probability_
on the type-token relationship in Shakespeare's plays.
A cursory glance at the data indicates that one cannot treat these as a
sample from a single population, even if the comedies, tragedies,
and historical plays are separated; there is a definite effect of the
individual work. Similar things can be noticed in the attempts of other
statisticians to do this, such as the writings of Yule.
I did look at some of the data; I have not published on this. It is quite
dangerous to say on the basis of a statistical test that two works are by
different authors.
-----------------
Date: Mon, 6 Jun 94 11:16:55 -0700
From: jtang@cogsci.Berkeley.EDU (Joyce Tang Boyland)
[Re: Mosteller and Wallace:]
...
The 1984 edition [see reply below] has a much more informative table of
contents than the original 1964 version published by Addison-Wesley.
------------------
Date: Tue, 7 Jun 1994 10:33:39 --100
From: Gregory.Grefenstette@xerox.fr (Gregory Grefenstette)
Frederick Mosteller and David L. Wallace
"Applied Bayesian and Classical Inference: The case of the Federalist
Papers, 2nd Edition of 'Inference and Disputed Authorship: The Federalist"
(Springer-Verlag)
this book gives statistical methods for deciding which of the
Federalist papers were written by Hamilton and which were written by
Jefferson.
------------------
From: Robert.Sigley@vuw.ac.nz
Date: Sat, 04 Jun 1994 13:02:58 +1200
I've just finished reading (and returned, unfortunately) a collection of
papers which I can thoroughly recommend to anyone trying to identify an
author by style.
It's called "Statistics and Style" and appeared in 1968. ... on checking
the library online catalogue, I find that no extra information is given
for
it, so I won't be able to confirm this identification until it's reshelved
(within 2 days, I hope). As far as I remember, the editor had a
Slavic-type
name beginning with `G'; a grep of the library's entire author index makes
J. Gvozdanovic the most likely option (listed for another book in the
general area of linguistics, but unconnected to the topic under
discussion), but this id is tentative for now.
Analyses covered include comparisons of
(1) word-length spectra (and a number of statistics calculated from them);
(2) sentence-length spectra (which are found to follow a log-normal
distribution for any particular text by a single author. Author behaviour
is reasonably consistent, but there is considerable overlap between
different authors in the same genre);
(3) use of certain vocabulary items previously identified as `typical' of
the candidate author(s) on the basis of uncontested works;
(4) use of certain grammatical constructions;
(5) counts of certain grammatical classes (eg noun/verb ratios, or
adjective/verb ratios).
The final paper in the collection is perhaps the most important, as it
deals
with the general question of reliability.
Overall, it has to be said that the crude general statistics above are not
useful for deciding questions of authorship unless:
(i) the number of possible candidate authors is small;
(ii) we have a large body of work from each of the candidate authors;
(iii) this corpus covers the entire span of their career (or at least
shows
little change over time); and
(iv) the corpus is in similar genres to the contested item.
In short, the rewards of such analysis are mostly not worth the
considerable time it used to take to compute the statistics. The results
are, I'm afraid, especially indecisive in answering questions in classics
(where this volume of work, and the historical information about potential
alternative authors, is often lacking).
But if there is only one candidate author, with a large known corpus, and
the exercise is simply to determine how similar to that author's style
the unknown text is, then it can still be attempted.
(1) and (2) above are now relatively quick and easy to calculate
with most concordance programs - providing the text is in machine-readable
form to start with! But they are the least author-specific methods.
(4) and (5) could be useful, but are still very time-consuming to
calculate, and require a whole lotta manual tagging of the texts. Best
avoided.
So (3) is probably going to be of most use in identifying a specific
author. The best approach I can think of would be to construct a
concordance (using OCP or similar) for a large corpus (20000 words
minimum)
of the candidate author, and then do the same for a similar-sized
matched-genre corpus from the author's contemporaries. (If the text's
general *date* is in doubt, you may as well give up now.)
Then you compare the frequency ratios of common vocabulary items (ie
frequency in candidate corpus/ frequency in mixed-contemporary corpus).
This will identify a number of vocabulary items which are used
proportionately much more or much less by the candidate author, and so can
be used as `characteristic' of that author. Discard items which are linked
in any literal sense to the text topic. Ignore very rare items (eg with
frequency less than 5 over 20000 words). To save yourself time, and to
maximise the sensitivity of your tests, look at only the 10 or so items
with
the largest differential frequency.
Now calculate the frequencies of the remaining items in the contested
text.
Compare these with both the candidate-author and contemporary corpora
frequencies.
Finally, conduct a series of statistical tests to determine whether any
differences you find can reasonably be attributed to chance. The best
method will depend on the frequencies you get at the end of all this; ask
a
friendly statistician.
Hope this helps. I'll mail back when I find the book again to confirm
its identity. I should add though that there's been considerable progress
in text manipulation on computers since its publication, so it's out of
date in some areas; however, this is more or less made up for by falling
interest and a lack of progress in statistical style analysis since 1970.
---------------------
From: Robert.Sigley@vuw.ac.nz
Date: Wed, 08 Jun 1994 16:34:09 +1200
The reference I mentioned is actually:
Lubomir Dolezel & Richard W. Bailey (eds) 1969. _Statistics_and_Style_.
New
York: American Elsevier Publishing Company.
I shall try to give a brief description of the more important collected
papers, with original references where possible.
Page references for quotes are from the collection, though.
Vocabulary Measures:
Paul Bennett. The Statistical Measurement of a Stylistic Trait in
_Julius_Caesar_ and _As_You_Like_It_. (from _Shakespeare_Quarterly_ VIII
(1957): 33-50)
Bennett applies Yule's characteristic (a measure of vocabulary
repetitiveness) to two very different plays by Shakespeare. Using a
card-sorting technique, this was very time-consuming; it would be much
quicker today! He finds that the characteristic is a useful measure of
style - it varies from act to act in a way predictable from the plays'
structures - but "should not care to suggest that the characteristic
is
going to provide an infallible test of authorship" (p40).
Charles Muller. Lexical Distribution Reconsidered: The Waring-Herdan
Formula.
(from _Cahiers_de_Lexicologie_ VI (1965): 35-53.)
Muller tests a rather complicated formula designed to predict the
word-frequency spectrum of a text. It works reasonably well on
material
from a variety of texts in several languages.
[The shape of the frequency distribution is therefore of little use in
author attribution. This formula has recently surfaced again in Baayen's
(1990, 1991) work on morphological productivity.-RJS]
Friederike Antosch. The Diagnosis of Literary Style with the
Verb-Adjective
Ratio. (translated from German original.)
Antosch analyses a number of plays by Grillparzer, Goethe and
Anzengruber, in terms of the verb/adjective ratio. She finds that this
is extremely sensitive to elements of genre (eg dialogue/ monologue;
and novels vs. academic writings) and characterisation (eg
lower-class/
upper-class). The V/A ratio may show local maxima within a play at
points of rising action and climactic scenes, and so is a potentially
useful stylistic indicator.
[Corollary: it's of very limited use for comparing authors unless these
factors can be controlled.]
See also:
G. Udny Yule. 1944. _The_Statistical_Study_of_Literary_Vocabulary_.
Cambridge.
Sentence-level Measures:
C.B. Williams. A Note on the Statistical Analysis of Sentence-Length as a
Criterion of Literary Style.
Williams compares works by Chesterton, Wells and Shaw with respect to
their sentence-length frequency spectra. He finds that these spectra
are reasonably well modelled by a log-normal distribution (that is,
the
log of the sentence length has a normal distribution), and that the
three books studied have significantly different mean sentence lengths
- though the significance is marginal between Shaw and Chesterton.
Williams uses samples of 600 sentences (approx 15000 words) from each
book; this is a minimum sample size for work of this nature!
[NB we can't conclude from this that we have identified any characteristic
of the *authors*. -RJS]
Kai Rander Buch. A Note on Sentence-Length as Random Variable.
Buch comments on Williams' paper, presenting (with fearsome maths) a
statistical analysis of two works by the same author, and concluding
that the author's style has changed over time to such an extent that
the texts are significantly different under Williams' test.
See also:
C.B. Williams. 1956. Studies in the History of Probability and Statistics
IV. A
Note on an Early Statistical Study of Literary Style. _Biometrika_ XLIII
(1956): 248-256.
G. Udny Yule. 1938. On Sentence-Length as a Statistical Characteristic of
Style
in Prose, with Application to Two Cases of Disputed Authorship.
_Biometrika_
XXX (1938-39): 363-390.
[Hence gross sentence-length measures are of little use for author
attributions: they can return non-significant differences between
different
authors, and significant differences between texts by the same author.
They
simply aren't specific enough. -RJS]
Curtis W. Hayes. A Study in Prose Styles: Edward Gibbon and Ernest
Hemingway.
(from _Texas_Studies_in_Literature_and_Language_ VII (1966): 371-386.)
Hayes avoids the above problem by taking a more detailed
transformational analysis of passages of Gibbon & Hemingway. He finds
a
variety of grammatical patterns which show highly significant
differences between the two authors - in particular, passives,
doublets, infinitival nominals, and relative clauses are far commoner
in Gibbon.
[This is a valuable stylistic measure, though not a method I would have
the
patience to use myself! But it doesn't serve to identify the authors,
so much as the very different genres they write in. -RJS]
Studies of Individual Author Styles:
John B. Carroll. Vectors of Prose Style.
(from Thomas A. Sebeok (ed) 1960. _Style_In_Language_. MIT Press:
283-292.)
This is an interesting use of factor analysis to determine the
linguistic correlates of literary judgements.
George M. Landon. The Quantification of Metaphoric Language in the Verse
of
Wilfred Owen.
Least said the better.
Frederick L.Burwick. Stylistic Continuity and Change in the Prose of
Thomas
Carlyle.
The mutant offspring of an entropic study of 5-word wordclass
sequences, and a more traditional literary analysis. The latter wins
out, but is not easily applicable to other authors.
Karl Kroeber. Perils of Quantification: The Exemplary Case of Jane
Austen's
_Emma_.
Kroeber undertakes a detailed analysis of the vocabulary of Austen,
Eliot, Dickens and [E.] Bronte. While many of the restrictions he
places on his samples are arbitrary, this is potentially a useful
direction for author comparison and attribution (see below).
See also the case studies:
Alvar Ellegard. 1962.
_A_Statistical_Method_for_Determining_Authorship:_The_
Junius_Letters,_1769-1772_. Gothenburg Studies in English 13.
Ivor S. Francis. 1966. An Exposition of a Statistical Approach to the
Federalist Dispute, in Jacob Leed (ed) _The_Computer_and_Literary_Style_.
Ohio.
Survey of the field:
Richard W. Bailey. Statistics and Style: A Historical Survey. (pp217-236)
This deals with the general question of reliability:
"What is wanted... is a litmus test by which the critic can decide
whether or not two given texts were written by the same author. Though
some attempts have been made to formulate such a test, they have been
almost wholly unsuccessful." (p222)
Some other surveys cited by Bailey:
William J. Paisley. 1964. Identifying the Unknown Communicator [...]
_The_Journal_of_Communication_, XIV (1964): 219-237.
Rebecca Posner. 1963. The Use and Abuse of Stylistic Statistics.
_Archivum_Linguisticum_ XV (1963): 111-119.
Overall, it has to be said that the crude general statistics above are not
useful for deciding questions of authorship unless:
(i) the number of possible candidate authors is small;
(ii) we have a large body of work from each of the candidate authors;
(iii) this corpus covers the entire span of their career (or at least
shows
little change over time); and
(iv) the corpus is in similar genres to the contested item.
In short, the rewards of such analysis are mostly not worth the
considerable time it used to take to compute the statistics. The results
are, I'm afraid, especially indecisive in answering questions in classics
(where this volume of work, and the historical information about potential
alternative authors, is often lacking).
But if there is only one candidate author, with a large known corpus, and
the exercise is simply to determine how similar to that author's style
the unknown text is, then it can still be attempted.
The general vocabulary and sentence-length measures above are now
relatively quick and easy to calculate with most concordance programs -
providing the text is in machine-readable form to start with! But they are
the least author-specific methods. Possibly they could be of use as a
preliminary check before plunging into more time-consuming methods.
More specific grammatical analysis could be useful, but very
time-consuming
to calculate, requiring a whole lotta manual tagging of the texts. Best
avoided.
So an intermediate 'specific vocabulary' index is probably going to be of
most use in identifying a specific author. The best approach I can think
of
would be to construct a concordance (using OCP or similar) for a large
corpus (20000 words minimum) of the candidate author, and then do the same
for a similar-sized matched-genre corpus from the author's contemporaries.
(If the text's general *date* is in doubt, you may as well give up now.)
Then you compare the frequency ratios of common vocabulary items (ie
frequency in candidate corpus/ frequency in mixed-contemporary corpus).
This will identify a number of vocabulary items which are used
proportionately much more or much less by the candidate author, and so can
be used as `characteristic' of that author. Discard items which are linked
in any literal sense to the text topic. Ignore very rare items (eg with
frequency less than 5 over 20000 words). To save yourself time, and to
maximise the sensitivity of your tests, look at only the 10 or so items
with
the largest differential frequency.
Now calculate the frequencies of the remaining items in the contested
text.
Compare these with both the candidate-author and contemporary corpora
frequencies.
Finally, conduct a series of statistical tests to determine whether any
differences you find can reasonably be attributed to chance. The best
method will depend on the frequencies you get at the end of all this; ask
a
friendly statistician.
Hope this helps. I should add though that there's been considerable
progress in text manipulation on computers since 1970, so it's out of
date in some areas; however, this is more or less made up for by falling
interest and a lack of progress in statistical style analysis since then.
----------------
------------------------------
End of b-greek-digest V1 #548
*****************************
** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **
To unsubscribe from this list write
majordomo@virginia.edu
with "unsubscribe b-greek-digest" as your message content. For other
automated services write to the above address with the message content
"help".
For further information, you can write the owner of the list at
owner-b-greek@virginia.edu
You can send mail to the entire list via the address:
b-greek@virginia.edu