From: Edgar M. Krentz (emkrentz@mcs.com)
Date: Thu Aug 24 1995 - 19:45:27 EDT
Ron Stephens wrote:
>I'm hoping you will help me resolve a dilemma with 2nd Corinthians 5:19.
>While the question has to do with the English, I'm hoping that your
>knowledge of Greek will reveal the answer. I've been challenged concerning
>this verse, as to the intended meaning of the conjunction "in".
>
>2Cor. 5:19 KJV "...God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself..."
>2Cor. 5:19 NIV "...God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ..."
>
>Was God IN (i.e. within) Christ, as the KJV punctuation implies, or was God
>reconciling the world INn (by means of) Christ, as the NIV indicates.
Good question from the English text. The Greek text, translated in
literalist fashion, reads "God was in Christ world reconciling to himself."
The word order favors understanding "in Christ" as a dative of manner (= an
adverb) modifying "was ... reconciling." The KJV is impossible, since "was
... reconciling" is a relatively late grammatical formation to indicate an
on-going action (analagous to our English "was reconciling." In short, the
NIV is more accurate.
As you can easily see, I think the Greek is more clear than David Moore
suggests in his response to you. It will be interesting to read other
reactions
Hope this helps.
Edgar Krentz <emkrentz@mcs.com>
New Testament, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
Voice: 312-753-0752; FAX: 312-753-0782
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