From: David Moore (dvdmoore@ix.netcom.com)
Date: Mon Oct 02 1995 - 11:01:59 EDT
"Philip L. Graber" <pgraber@emory.edu> wrote, and Carl Conrad answered:
>>I am a bit puzzled by the grammar of this verse. Is there another way
you
>>might expect this verse to be written?
>Probably; I read the sentence first, before even looking at your
question.
>It IS puzzling; I then looked at Mark's version which I assume to have
been
>redacted by Matthew (although I'm much more cautious about taking that
for
>granted than I used to be; isn't it interesting, by the way, how Ken
Litwak
>so underhandedly admits that the only books he has on source criticism
are
>those who are "agin' it"?), and behold, Mark's version of this
sentence
>makes more sense, but I think Matthew's is confusing because he has
tried
>to reshape it into a better-told story.
Specifically, are
relative
>>pronouns--occurrences of O(/N in this verse--usually used in
independent
>>clauses this way, or are these not truly independent clauses?
>I think there are a couple problems in the way you've formulated the
>question; for one thing, I'm not altogether sure that it's fair to say
that
>Greek narrative operates with independent clauses in the way we'd say
they
>do in English; i.e., the unit of discourse in Greek is the paragraph,
and I
>rather think that our methods of punctuation are in many instances
applied
>rather artificially to Greek. Secondly, but dependent upon that first
note,
>within the paragraph it's not at all uncommon to designate with a
relative
>pronoun a referent that has already been named (or even that will soon
>thereafter be named) with a relative pronoun. It is perhaps more
common in
>Latin than in the Greek of the Synoptic gospels (but also common, I
think,
>in Paul's letters) for what we'd call a new sentence or independent
clause
>to begin with a relative pronoun which we tend in English to translate
with
>a demonstrative, e.g.:
> hON DE EN THi hODWi EIDOMEN
> "And that man [or "him"] we saw in the street."
>>I tend to
>>want to translate Mt 21:35 as a series of dependent clauses,
dependent on
>>the following verse: "And when the vine-dressers had received his
slaves,
>>one of whom they beat, another they killed, and another they stoned,
again
>>he sent other slaves, more than the first, and they did to them the
same
>>thing."
>Although your version certain expresses the meaning of the text, it
>doesn't, as I think you realize (and this is precisely why you're
puzzled)
>convey exactly the sense of the construction in the Greek text. I
think the
>sense of the construction might best be conveyed thus: "And the
>vine-dressers took the slaves, of whom they flayed one, killed one,
and
>stoned one." It is a common narrative device in Greek to use a
participle
>(or two or three) in the aorist and then an indicative to indicate a
>sequence of actions where English would prefer to use coordinate
>indicatives, as I have done in effect in my version above.
>>What makes this reading particularly awkward is that LABO/NTES OI(
>>GEWRGOI\ is nominative, but does not agree with the subject of the
>>independent verb A)PE/STEILEN in v. 36. What do [you] make of all
this? Does my
>>translation reflect a valid understanding of the text? It seems to me
that
>>the use of the participle and the relative pronouns certainly serves
to
>>subordinate the actions described at least pragmatically to what
follows;
>>i.e. that the point of the two verses combined is to emphasize that
many
>>servants were sent more than once, and all were mistreated--the
series
>>of sendings and mistreatments being treated as a single narrative
>>"event". Is this a valid understanding of the grammar?
>Well, I really don't think I'd link the two verses that way, and I
suspect
>that, given our present philosophy of punctuation, the editors of GNT4
>(what I'm looking at right now) have got it right by putting a period
at
>the end of v. 35.
>It seems to me that v. 35 deals solely with the action of the
>husbandmen/vine-dressers (those are both pretty archaic words in
English,
>aren't they?). I think (but I may be wrong) that you are trying to see
in
>that participle LABONTES an indication that v. 35 as a whole is
supposed to
>be subordinate to v. 36. You asked if there wasn't another way this
could
>be phrased, and I'd say that a rather nice (IMHO) formulation of vv.
35-36
>as you want to read them would be:
> LABONTWN DE TWN GEWRGWN TOUS DOULOUS AUTOU, TON MEN DEIRANTWN,
TON DE
> APOKTEINANTWN, TON DE LIQOBOLHSANTWN, PALIN APESTEILEN ALLOUS
DOULOUS
> ...
>Certainly v. 35 would be better Greek, in my opinion, if it were
phrased thus:
> hOI DE GEWRGOI TOUS DOULOUS AUTOU LABONTES APEKTEINAN, TON MEN
> DEIRANTES, TON DE LIQOBOLHSANTES.
>It's really pretty awkward to put APEKTEINAN in the middle between
EDEIRAN
>and ELIQOBOLHSAN.
>And yes, the relative pronouns are somewhat awkward too, although not,
I
>think, really anomalous. If in fact Matthew had Mark's text in front
of him
>and tried to improve on it, it's too bad he couldn't have done better
than
>this. Still, those relative clauses aren't really so bad as the ones
in
>that opening sequence of Ephesians!
>How about, when the SBL committee gets around to revising BDF, we ask
them
>to work out a new scheme of punctuation at the same time? I haven't
read
>that monster of a book on the history of punctuation that was
published two
>or three years ago, but from the reviews of it I gather that
stabilization
>of punctuation conventions is a relatively recent phenomenon about
which
>there is not yet universal consensus. I really think something better
could
>be worked out for Greek that is not derivative from western European
>languages and is more consistent with its actual normative structures
(if
>we can ever define them--but that's your profession, isn't it?)
There is a factor that has not been taken into consideration in
either Carl's analysis or in that presented by Mark Durie, but it is
key to understanding this passage.
Philip is correct in noting that v. 36 is a continuation of the
thoughts begun in v. 35, but he is not correct in thinking that the
participle LABONTES should agree with the subject of the following
verb. The relationship indicated is one of time, not of personal
identity. The aorist tense of the participle LABONTES indicates here
that the incidents of mistreatment of the owner's messengers had
already taken place when he sent other of his servants.
This factor is integral to the story of the parable, since
finally, and with full knowledge of the tenants actions, the owner
sends his own son (v. 37).
Regarding the punctuation of v. 35, the period at the end of the
verse seems to correspond more to the usual translation rendering than
to the Greek construction. It is easier for us to translate "When the
tenants had received his servants, they beat one, killed another, and
another they stoned. Again (the owner) sent other servants....," than
to than to work up something that joins the two clauses into a single
sentence. Nevertheless, something like "Even though the tenants, upon
the arrival of his servants, had beaten one, killed another, and stoned
a third, (the owner) again sent other servants...." might work alright
and preserves the relationship between the clauses.
I'm sending a copy of this post to b-greek. Please feel free to
answer to that list, as this post is somewhat off-topic for the
Greek-Grammar list where I picked up the thread.
David L. Moore Department of Education
Miami, FL, USA Southeastern Spanish District
Dvdmoore@ix.netcom.com of the Assemblies of God
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