From: Don Wilkins (dwilkins@ucr.campus.mci.net)
Date: Sat Dec 26 1998 - 18:53:34 EST
At 10:01 AM 12/24/98 -0600, Carl W. Conrad wrote:
>At 7:55 PM -0500 12/23/98, Jonathan Robie wrote:
>>A rather long time ago, Carl Conrad wrote:
>>
>>>BUT--the imperfect (indicative) retains one function in Koine that it had
>>>in Classical Attic: it is used in both protasis and apodosis of present
>>>counterfactual conditions. I've never been able to figure out a good reason
>>>why the indicative should function in Greek for a counterfactual
>>>condition--but of course the aorist indicative does so in past
>>>counterfactual conditions also.
I don't *think* this is a problem, though I could be mistaken. One has to
keep in mind that the indicative is not the mood of fact or truth in the
real world sense. For example, lies are told in the indicative.
Contrary-to-fact statements do not posit a real (subjunctive) or unlikely
(optative) potential, but rather a hypothetical which is clearly false, so
perhaps they have something in common with lies.
>>Are imperfects in the protasis and apodosis always *present* counterfactual
>>conditions? Consider the following:
>>
>>Matt 23:30
>>
>>EI HMEQA EN TAIS hHMERAIS TWN PATERWN hHMWN, OUK AN HMEQA AUTWN KOINWNOI EN
>>TWi hAIMATI TWN PROFHTWN
>
>Yes, I think so. Isn't this, in effect, "Even IF we were in existence in
>our fathers' days, we (still) wouldn't be participants in the blood(shed)
>of the prophets = in the shedding of the blood of the prophets).
>
>What's odd here is the imperfect HMEQA where one really should expect
>perhaps an EGENOMEQA; I take it that we have an imperfect here because
>there is no aorist of EIMI. Properly speaking I think this ought to be a
>"mixed" condition, since the HMEQA clearly means, "had been in existence."
Carl may very well be correct, and his point about EIMI lacking an aorist is
well-taken. There are clear instances--though I can't think of any
off-hand--where EIMI in the imperfect is used of a simple past event, and it
may be that aktionsart (in the linguists' sense) has something to do with
the lack of an aorist.
But here's another conjecture: the thought of the sentence may instead be,
"If we were in the days of our fathers (right now), we would not (now)
etc.". I.e., the impossible hypothetical is that of transforming those
ancient days to the present, just the reverse of a past contrary "If we had
been..., we would not have...." Or, on the flip side, take HMEQA as a use of
the imperfect for the aorist due to the deponent nature of EIMI. In either
situation, the simple condition is preserved. That's not a big gain, but I
would guess that Carl's EGNOMEQA would have been more likely for the
protasis had a mixed condition been intended (note my finely-crafted Eng.
past CTF ;-) ).
Don Wilkins
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