From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Wed Oct 08 1997 - 12:07:03 EDT
At 10:56 AM -0500 10/8/97, Ronald Wong wrote:
>hello again. Please help.
>
>Rom 1.24 DIO PAREDWKEN AUTOUS hO QEOS EN TAIS EPIQUMIAIS TWN KARDIWN
>AUTOWN EIS AKAQARSIAN *TOU* ATIMAZESQAI TA SOWMATA AUTWN EN hAUTOIS,...
>
>where's the TOU make sense here?
>
>Therfore, God gave them over to uncleanlness in the lusts of the hearts
>of them . . . to dishonor the bodies of them in these (or themselves)?
The genitive with an infinitive is rather frequent in Koine Greek to
express purpose; it means exactly the same thing that a hINA + subjunctive
clause would do. Originally there was a preposition (hENEKA) requiring the
genitive that meant "for the sake of"; this came gradually to be omitted
and the articular infinitive in the genitive case came to be a construction
for purpose.
SO: When you see a TOU + infinitive (and no countermanding indicators), you
can usually be sure that it's an infinitive of purpose; translate the
infinitive as "in order to xxx". So here, "in order to dishonor their own
bodies ..."
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/
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