From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Wed Apr 28 1999 - 12:54:22 EDT
At 10:13 PM +0700 4/28/99, Julie Woodson wrote:
>In Titus 1 verse 6, some qualifications of an overseer, of whom should the
>phrase 'not accused of dissipation or rebellion' be understood as a
>description?
>
>Is it modifying children? Or is it modifying TIS? How is such a question
>decided?
>
>The comma in the UBS4 text would indicate to me that it is part of the list
>of qualifications of the overseer. However, is there any intrinsic evidence
>to collaborate the punctuation, having been added much later on, and, as I
>understand, somewhat irregularly or should I say, arbitrarily?
Thanks for raising this question; I don't think I've ever noticed this
interesting little problem, although we've had several discussions over the
years about MIAS GUNAIKOS ANHR. The text in question reads:
... EI TIS ESTIN ANEGKLHTOS, MIAS GUNAIKOS ANHR, TEKNA ECWN PISTA, MH EN
KATHGORIAi ASWTIAS H ANUPOTAKTA.
(1) I don't see how ANUPOTAKTA can refer to anything but TEKNA, and since
ANUPOTAKTA is linked coordinately with MH EN KATHGORIAi ASWTIAS, it would
seem to me that that phrase also ought to be understood as referring to
TEKNA. And yet, and yet ...
(2) The phrase, MH EN KATHGORIAi ASWTIAS is something of an anomaly or even
a solecism (at any rate, I don't think that one would get away with it in a
Greek composition class): a negated prepositional phrase clearly intended
to function as an epithet or attribute, be it of TIS or of TEKNA--more
likely TEKNA, I think. It looks like the phrase is intended to stand for
something like a relative clause, e.g. hOSA MH ASWTIAS KATHGORHQH or an
attributive epithet such as TA MH ASWTIAS KATHGORHQENTA.
Does this not strike anyone else as an awkward phrase grammatically? The
grammars that I have ready to hand and have consulted (BDF, AT Robertson,
Wallace) either have consigned the problem to outer darkness or have not
deigned to take note of it. Perhaps I am missing something so obvious that
I am myself in outer darkness (or inner darkness?--like Oedipus, TUFLOS TA
T'WTA TON TE NOUN TA T'OMMATA).
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
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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