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b-greek-digest V1 #840
b-greek-digest Tuesday, 29 August 1995 Volume 01 : Number 840
In this issue:
BAGD ed. 3
Re: Pocket Greek NT?
Re: Harold Greeknee's address
Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
WP or WFW vs. Nota Bene
Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Re: WP or WFW vs. Nota Bene
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Edgar M. Krentz" <emkrentz@mcs.com>
Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 16:55:19 -0600
Subject: BAGD ed. 3
Some time ago Eric Weiss asked
>What is the status of the English edition of the revision to BAGD, i.e., when
>will it be available, what is the retail and discount mail-order price?
I answered him with the following information, which may be of interest to
readers of B-Greek [I don't think it appeared there, at least not to my
recollection.
Fred Danker delivered the completed manuscript of the third edition to the
University of Chicago Press in early April. (Can one call something on a
hard disk a manuscript?)
I called Fred for more information. He is now in the labor-intensive task
of reading page proofs. The target date for its appearance in print is the
Society of Biblical Literature meeting in 1996, i.e. Thanksgiving, 1996. Of
course, it is always possible that the press might publish a bit beofre
that date.
The price is not yet set, of course. Fred has asked the press to keep it
below $75.00, if possible; but that may be a dream of Fred's that will not
correlate with reality. No one can guess what the mail-order discount price
will be--or if indeed there will be one!
I no longer have students purchase the 2nd edition. I will recommend the
purchase of Abbott-Smith's _Manual Greek Lexicon_ or some other small work
(Souter, if still in print) and send them to the library to use BAGD, ed.
2.
If you want more acurate information, you might drop a note to Prof.
Frederick W. Danker, 3438 Russell Ave., St. Louis, MO 63104. Tel.:
314-772-5757.
Peace,
Edgar Krentz <emkrentz@mcs.com>
New Testament, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
Voice: 312-753-0752; FAX: 312-753-0782
------------------------------
From: Rod Decker <rdecker@accunet.com>
Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 19:34:06 -0500
Subject: Re: Pocket Greek NT?
>No doubt the one you have seen is the British and Foreign Bible Societies'
>Greek NT. The latter editions of that were edited by G.D. Kilpatrick and
>had more textual information but still were not any larger than the older
>one. I can put mine in my shirt pocket. BIBLIA ETAIRIA (Bible Company) in
>Athens Greece produces to very small folio editions, one in Modern Greek and
>one of what is very close to the Textus Receptus. I have both of those.
>
>Carlton Winbery
>La College, Pineville, LA
The edition I saw was not the BFBS edition, but much smaller: vest pocket
size. Is the Athens edition you mention still in print? If so, could you be
more specific as to the size? Any idea where it could be purchased?
Rod
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rodney J. Decker Calvary Theological Seminary
Asst. Prof./NT 15800 Calvary Rd.
Kansas City, Missouri 64147
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
------------------------------
From: "James K. Tauber" <jtauber@tartarus.uwa.edu.au>
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 08:51:31 +0800 (WST)
Subject: Re: Harold Greeknee's address
On Mon, 28 Aug 1995, Micheal Palmer wrote:
> I am trying to find a copy of J. Harold Greenlee's _A New Testament Greek
> Morpheme Lexicon_ for our library. It is out of print. Do any of you know
> how to contact the author? Is he on this list?
A few years back I bought the last known copy for sale in Australia :-)
The book is excellent although suffers from being in book form. It would be
much better in electronic form, linked to an inflectionally parsed text
(and probably dictionary).
When I bought the book, Zondervan had just decided to discontinue the
book. Harold Greenlee (now retired in Floria, I believe) was keen to make
the information freely available, possibly in electronic form.
I offered to convert the text into a standard format and make it
available (and I'd still like to do this) but after a couple of exchanges
with someone at SIL who has Harold's data on disk, I haven't heard anything.
If someone is in contact with Harold, or knows someone at SIL who has the
disk, PLEASE LET ME KNOW. I'm very keen to make this valuable work of
Harold's available.
Thanks for reminding me of this Micheal. :-)
James K. Tauber <jtauber@tartarus.uwa.edu.au>
University Computing Services and Centre for Linguistics
University of Western Australia, Perth, AUSTRALIA
http://www.uwa.edu.au/student/jtauber
------------------------------
From: Jan.Haugland@uib.no
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 02:52:00 +0200
Subject: Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Carl W. Conrad said:
> I was going just to let this pass but I couldn't. While I agree that the
> Synoptic gospels all have Jesus-sayings indicating that the "Coming" of the
> Son of Man will take place within the lifetimes of those hearing Jesus,
YES! Thank you for pointing this out. It's the crucial point, and I will come
back to this. I believe that the gospels actually reflect true, authentic oral
statements made by Jesus to the disciples. These statements were well known
among all Christians even before a single book of the NT was written. The
underlying Christian faith in the imminent parousia was built on these
statements, and the earliest books -- the Pauline letters -- simply refer to a
faith that was already present.
> I
> think it is a gross overstatement to say that this is the teaching of "the
> whole NT,"
It is of course a subjective statement with a certain lack of precision, but I
stand by it.
We have the synoptics stating this clearly. We agree so far.
The Gospel of John has the same message, in places like Jn16:16: "A little
while, and you will see me no more; again a little while, and you will see me."
In Jn21:22 we also find that based on Jesus statements, the discipled had
(mistakenly) assumed that Jesus had *guaranteed* that John would live to see
the parousia. John corrects this, but this is evidence that they expected the
coming within one generation.
In Acts 2:16, Peter states that they were living *in the last days.* Later, in
Acts 17:31, we see most translations say merely that Jesus "will judge" the
world (oikomene). "He will judge" is "mellei krinein," and the Greek experts
here should have no difficulty observing that there is a shade of urgency here:
"he is about to judge," or "will soon judge."
For the epistles, let me try to be a bit chronologic:
1The is one of the letters most clearly showing the *urgency* in the Christian
expectations of the parousia. The most clear example can be found where Paul is
comforting the Thessalonikans who have lost someone in death. Paul comforts
them by stating that the dead ("sleeping") will certainly not lose their
reward.
1The4:15 "For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are
alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, shall not precede those
who have fallen asleep."
Here we see that Paul clearly expects to be alive; he says that "WE who are
alive" and those who are dead will *then* meet the Lord in the sky at the same
time.
Obviously, this letter caused some misunderstandings, and in 2Thess Paul
emphasised that the coming had not yet occurred; they were still waiting for a
few events to take place first. Yet, he did not doubt that the parousia would
take place within a normal lifespan.
We find this repeated all over the letters. In his first letter to Corinth this
is especially manifest. He wrote to those "upon whom the end of the ages has
come." (1Co10:11) To them, Paul reveals something that is not merely his
opinion, but words from God, and which reminds us about the words to
Thessalonika above: "I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall
all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet."
(1Co15:51,52) Again, it should not be necessary to point out that "we"
includes Paul.
I don't have to use more arguments to show that the epistles of Paul has the
*imminent* Parousia all over. The battle cry for the Christian, persecuted and
suffering under the evil of this world, was "The Lord is at hand." (Php4:5)
I should hardly need to point out the obvious fact that in no language spoken
by men, can an expression like this -- "at hand" -- indicate a period of 1900
years or more.
> and I think there is considerable evidence indicating that in
> Matthew and Luke the "Coming" is conceived as distanced from the
> destruction of the temple and Jerusalem by an indefinite period of time,
> one that in Luke appears to be rather lengthy, in fact.
You will have to point this out, for I have in a quite careful examination of
these accounts come to the opposite conclusion.
> So could you explain, please, what you mean by saying that 'The whole NT is
> emphasising that the second coming would occur within the lifespan of those
> people he were talking to. The disciples asked Jesus when the "end of the
> age" would be. Jesus explained, and it all came to pass in 70AD?'
I think I have done this, and you should find further examples in the epistles
of John, Jude and Peter (authentic or not). The fact that I am missing some
books in my list above is not lack of examples, but that I don't want this
article to be too long. Let me simply conclude by referring to the Revelation
of John, which I am certain was a message about the forthcoming destruction of
Jerusalem:
Rev 22:20 "He who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming
soon." Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!"
All the best,
- - Jan
- --
"I have seen the future and it is just like the present, only longer."
-- Kehlog Albran, _The Profit_
------------------------------
From: Jan.Haugland@uib.no
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 02:52:08 +0200
Subject: Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Philip Graber said:
> The evidence would seem to indicate (and the conclusion is widely held)
> that Matthew and Luke are both written after the destruction of
> Jerusalem. It would seem particularly awkward for the gospel writers to
> have taught that the coming of the Son of Man was to coincide with the
> destruction of Jerusalem if that is the case, especially since they still
> seem to be looking forward to it in some sense.
Since the late dating of these books is *based* on the fact that they mention
the destruction of Jerusalem and on the assumption that Jesus couldn't possibly
have prophecied about the destruction of Jerusalem, we have a circular argument
above.
If Matthew was written after the destruction of Jerusalem, we have him making
Jesus look very silly in stating that "Immediately after the tribulation of
those days" (24:29) -- the siege on Jerusalem (v15,16) -- the Son of Man will
come on the clouds with power and glory (v30), if indeed, He did not come.
Cheers,
- - Jan
- --
"The more we disagree, the more chance there
is that at least one of us is right."
------------------------------
From: Jan.Haugland@uib.no
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 02:52:15 +0200
Subject: Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Bruce Terry (now I hoep I got it right!) said:
> >There is no alternating. The destruction of the temple and the second
> >coming would occur at the same time.
>
> The alternating blocks are as follows in Matt. 24:
> where A: destruction of temple/Jerusalem
> B: second coming of Christ
Based on the *assumption* that these are not one and the same thing. You will
have to point out arguments for putting 1900+ years between these blocks of
texts. There is nothing that I see that indicates such "alternating".
> B: vv. 4-14 Warnings about troubles that are NOT signs of Christ's advent
Since we agree that these are NOT signs of anything, but in fact non-signs that
Jesus warns against being mislead by, they can't possibly apply to this coming.
You should remove the "B" above.
> A: vv. 15-22 Troubles at the desolation of Jerusalem
> B: vv. 23-28 Advent of Christ NOT at that time; rather, it will be as
> obvious as lightning and vultures
You have a problem here. v23 starts with "then", gr "tote" which means, well,
"then". Jesus is warning against false prophets and such during the Jewish War.
Read Josephus for a confirmation that these really came!
As for vultures, these can also mean "eagles". The "carcass", the Jews, were to
be found and overpowered by the Roman army wherever they found them. The Roman
army used an eagle as it's symbol, so this would be a very obvious picture to
people in the 1st century.
> A: v. 29 Transition from the desolation of Jerusalem ("after those
> days")
"*Immediately* after the tribulation of those days", again referring to the
siege on Jerusalem.
> B: vv. 30-33 Coming of the Son of Man
This shift is not possible either. Verse 30 begins with "then" [=tote], so it
refers directly to the preceding words. These dramatic celestial events (I hope
this is an audience where I don't have to point out that these are well-used
symbols in the OT) would be *the* sign of the coming of Christ. THEN he would
come.
> A: vv. 34-35 Events of this generation
"Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things
be fulfilled." The world "ALL" is pretty inclusive. If ALL would happen to
*that* generation who witnessed Jesus saying these words, there's not much
left, is it?
> Note that in 23-28 Jesus is very clear that his advent will NOT be at the
> time of tribulation that would occur when the abomination of desolation stood
> on holy ground (understand with Luke "when the hated Roman armies stood on
> the holy ground of Jerusalem").
On the contrary, Jesus is simply warning the disciples against being mislead by
false prophets. These false prophets would of course say, as so many times
before, that the Jewish army would overpower the Romans and win the war, as
they had done in the Macabbean war some centuries earlier (the word
"abomination" refers to Daniel and the hated Antiochus). Following these false
prophets would mean death when Jerusalem fell. Jesus was most explicit in
saying that they had to *leave* Jerusalem and not be mislead by those who said
they should stay.
Never forget that the whole so-called eschatology in the gospels is *about* the
destruction of Jerusalem. That's the question the disciples want the answer to
in the first place. Christ's "visitation" or "parousia" as King was to bring
punishment to the fallen Israel and forever end the Mosaic dispensation. That
was the end of the age!
Cheers,
- - Jan
- --
"Call on God, but row away from the rocks."
-- Indian proverb
------------------------------
From: Tim McLay <nstn1533@fox.nstn.ca>
Date: Mon, 28 Aug 95 23:36:58 -0400
Subject: WP or WFW vs. Nota Bene
Ken's question addressed the comparative merits of WP (+Scripture Fonts I
would suggest) or WFW (+ WinGreek) as opposed to Nota Bene. I use both
of the former programs with Papyrus (for bibliog.) as Philip Graber
suggested and both are more than capable of meeting the demands of Doctoral
work. I have little experience with NB, mainly because when I got into
word processing NB was not very user friendly. That continues to
be true; furthermore, I know it was over a year between the release of a
new version in '93 (version 4.0?) and the manual (Have they produced the
manual yet?) Generally speaking, NB has not responded well to the demands
of the market place. However, having stated these negative criticisms,
it should be noted that I know people who use NB and they all swear by it.
Cheers,
Tim
--
Tim McLay
Halifax, NS
nstn1533@fox.nstn.ca
------------------------------
From: David Anvar <anvar@garnet.berkeley.edu>
Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 19:50:34 -0700
Subject: Re: BG: Synoptic Apocalypse
Jan,
What does it mean that "And Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles
*until* the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled." Lk 21:24b Does this not
suggest a period of time between the destruction of Jerusalem and some other
great event to follow?
Also what do you make of the saying that went about among the brethren
that John would not die? (Jn 21:23) This "saying" suggests that "If I will
that he remain till I(Jesus) come" then he will live a very long long time
i.e. until Christ returns. There may not have been such a strong aggreement
about how soon the Lord's return would be.
Finally....do you deny the physical resurrection of the dead?
David U.C. Berkeley
------------------------------
From: "James D. Ernest" <ernest@mv.mv.com>
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 01:02:01 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: WP or WFW vs. Nota Bene
On Mon, 28 Aug 1995, Tim McLay wrote:
> work. I have little experience with NB, mainly because when I got into
> word processing NB was not very user friendly. That continues to
> be true; furthermore, I know it was over a year between the release of a
> new version in '93 (version 4.0?) and the manual (Have they produced the
> manual yet?) Generally speaking, NB has not responded well to the demands
> of the market place. However, having stated these negative criticisms,
In my limited experience "user friendliness" appears to be inversely
proportional to the quality of being adaptable to the user's particular
requirements and permissive of fine-tuned customizing. At any rate,
NB 4 is considerably more user-friendly than previous versions (without
losing any customizability). People who don't mind lifting the hood
and doing a bit of tinkering can make N.B. do in a single keystroke
many things that other word processors can't do at all or can do only
with much mouse-flagellating and icon-clicking. In general, I would
say anyone who prefers DOS-type to Mac-type (including Windows)
interfaces, and probably people who consider themselves to have decent
aptitude for things like math, symbolic logic, or programming languages,
(dare I add Greek grammar and textual criticism?) has a good chance of
becoming a devoted N.B.
user. Others may like it ok or may prefer a Windows wp. If you
aren't going to explore and exploit its capabilities--and there's
no denying a significant learning curve if you want to do this--
then why bother? Buy a mouse and a Windows wp. Certainly it
is true that N.B. has historically had its problems with marketing.
The version 4 manual was late; but it has been out for quite a long
time now. The N.B. folks are said to be working on a Windows
version; I can't imagine what this will look like.....
I think the old reviews of N.B. (and XyWrite) are still right on
this point: best thing going for text entry and editing; not so
hot for desktop publishing incorporating graphics, charts, etc.
N.B. users were amused when Word made a big splash by introducing
spell-checking on the fly. They had been doing this for years.
THey can do it in Greek if they want to.
- -----------------------------------------------------------------
James D. Ernest Joint Doctoral Program
Manchester, New Hampshire, USA Andover-Newton/Boston College
Internet: ernest@mv.mv.com Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts
------------------------------
End of b-greek-digest V1 #840
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