From: dixonps@juno.com
Date: Sun Dec 19 1999 - 17:18:27 EST
On Sun, 19 Dec 1999 07:10:17 -0600 "Carl W. Conrad"
<cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu> writes:
<snip>
> I think Joe's comment is right on target here. Since I started a
response
> to this yesterday afternoon but didn't finish and send it, I'd like
> to piggy-back onto Joe's note a comment or two complementing his.
Yes, he had responded to me in private. I commended him on it, but did
not send
it back to the list, since he has sent it privately, but was glad to see
he realized
his oversight and sent it on to the list. I thought he explained well
the reason for
the different translations of YUCH in verses 35-37 by the KJV, NASB and
NIV,
amongst others. That explanation, of course, is elaborated upon by you
below.
I was wondering when Carl would sound forth. Usually your delay is due
either
to ponsiveness or time constraints, I have found. It is always greatly
appreciated.
Since relocating in Iowa 7 weeks ago from the incredibly gorgeous Oregon
territory,
my time constraints have been very real, as well.
> (1) Even in earlier (Homeric, pre-Socratic, Attic) and Hellenistic
Greek,
> YUCH is a word with a meaning hard to pin down and perilous to
> convey into English consistently with any single word not suited to the
context
> where YUCH is found. The earliest literary usage is in the opening of
the
> Iliad, where the wrath of Achilles, it is said,
>
> POLLAS D'IFQIMOUS YUCAS AIDI PROIAYEN
> hHRWWN, AUTOUS DE hELWRIA TEUCE KUNESSIN ..
> ("... hurled forth to Hades many stout YUCAS of heroes,
> but made themselves (the heroes) booty for dogs ..."
>
> Even there "soul" is very misleading for YUCAS if we are thinking of
any
> thing like "soul" in English traditional usage, which itself is
anything
> but monovalent, inasmuch as it can mean "deathless spirit," "person,"
> "personality," "core quality," etc.,
<snip>
>
> (2) When we start adding Hebraic conceptions/usages of YUCH in the
> LXX and NT, it gets more complicated: it is used for Heb. NEFESH in
Gen.
> 2:7, that
<snip>
> (3) Quite frankly, this is an immense topic; Paul's question about the
> shifting English words used for YUCH in Mk 8:35-37 was honest and
> naive at the same time: all of us sooner or later, I think, find that
we must
> come to terms with the ambivalence, not only of the English word
"soul,"
> but even more of the word YUCH in the Greek Bible: if ever there was a
> Greek word that does not lend itself to word-for-word consistent
> conversion from Greek to English, this is it.
<snip>
Yes, very good. Thanks. I have been so alerted and advised.
This helps explain the fluidity (evasiness?) of YUCH in Mk 8:35-37.
But, let's look at just verse 35, since that is the real verse in
question
here, as Joe points out. He argues the tension is between the two
kinds of YUCH, the lower and the higher, the physical and the spiritual.
That would seem to be the case. The alternative, to find one's life one
must lose it or to find one's soul one must lose it, seems inherently
contradictory.
It would seem better to understand it to mean that the one who desires
to save his YUCH at the higher or spiritual level must lose it or be
willing
to lose it (AUTHN) at the lower or physical level.
This interpretation does not preclude the teaching of salvation by grace
alone, since the latter may imply the former.
Paul Dixon
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