From: Jonathan Robie (jonathan@texcel.no)
Date: Wed Dec 31 1997 - 20:24:30 EST
At 04:10 PM 12/31/97 -0800, Dale M. Wheeler wrote:
>At 06:17 PM 12/31/97 -0500, Jonathan Robie wrote:
>If you actually look at the examples, eliminating those invalid ones, I
>think you'll see that the preponderance are anarthrous. Eg., Eph 2:8
>has frequently been listed as an example of an articular abstract noun
>(XARIS), but its not; the article there is clearly deietic point back
>to the previous use in vv 5, 7 (note esp., v 5), thus "this (previously
>referred to) grace".
The preponderance, yes. There are some with the article, though, e.g. Rev
5:13 hH EULOGIA KAI hH TIMH KAI hH DOXA KAI TO KRATOS.
>My point was not related to QEOS per se, but to the fact that the examples
>you were using to try to figure out whether QEOS was definite, indefinite,
>or qualitative based on the presence/absence of the article were for the
>most part invalid, ie., they told you nothing about the article, since
>there were other reasons for its absence/presence which superceded its
>use to show definiteness, etc. To try to figure these kinds of things out,
>you *must* first eliminate invalid examples before you can come up with
>some sort of guidelines.
My current understanding is that:
1. When the article is present, it is always definite;
2. The absence of the article is essentially unmarked; definiteness or
qualitativeness must be determined by other factors.
If (2) is true, then virtually *every* example will have external factors
that determine definiteness.
I make no claims that my current understanding is even vaguely adequate,
though ;->
>My personal view on John 1:1c
>is that QEOS is anathrous because its a predicate, non-convertible
>proposition; its qualitative (or definite...but I don't think here) because
>its precopulative (I'm not attempting to turn Colwell around here, ie.,
>QEOS is put before the verb because John intends it to be understood a
>certain way).
This is essentially in agreement with Paul Dixon's view, I believe - wasn't
he the person who came up with the precopulative distinction? I'm still
agnostic as to whether precopulative position makes a difference. I'm still
slogging my way through the examples...
>One other thing that may (??!!??) help is to remember that traditionally
>(and I don't think this covers everything), when grammars have referred
>to an anarthrous noun as *indefinite*, they don't mean that we don't know
>who is being referred to, but rather we are referring to a (normally
>singular) representative of a class. "I see a man (BLEPW ANQRWPON)."
>doesn't mean that I'm unsure what I'm BLEPWing, but rather I'm seeing
>a representative of the class "man". I'm not sure what representative
>(=a definite/specific man) I'm seeing, and I can't tell you in what
>ways he may or may not be a good representative (=qualitative), but
>I recognize enough to know that he is "a man". As I said, I don't
>think this covers all the nuances, but its a good place to start. This
>is why "indefinite", a god, doesn't work for John 1:1c, since Jesus/the
>Word would have to represent a class; but there is no class to represent
>in Judeo-Christian theology, since there is only 1 member.
Ah, this is really very helpful and clear! I think I'll use that...
Thanks!
Jonathan
___________________________________________________________________________
Jonathan Robie jwrobie@mindspring.com
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