From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Tue Feb 08 2000 - 08:29:17 EST
At 8:01 AM -0500 2/8/00, Bart Ehrman wrote:
> 1 Clement 27:7 gives a quotation of LXX Ps. 19:1-3, which includes the
>puzzling hH hHMERA THi hHMERAi EREUGETAI RHMA KAI NUX NUKTI ANAGGELLEI
>GNWSIN. A typical translation is something like "day utters speech to day
>and night proclaims knowledge to night." But I have no idea what that
>means (i.e., in English) (and note: I'm *not* asking what the original
>Hebrew meant, but what the Greek in 1 Clement did).
>
> What would you think of something a bit more paraphrastic that, while
>still strange, can at least be construed, something like: "One day utters
>a word to another, and one night proclaims knowledge to the next"?
This is pretty much my sense of it: the very kernel of the notion of "oral
transmission," assuming that information is transmitted perpetually, from
night to night, and from day to day, such that the message expressed by the
order of the universe--the glory of God--does not fade at all with the
passage of days and nights. Admittedly this is still an understanding of
the LXX of the Psalm; exactly what Clement meant might be clearer with a
look at the context in which his citation appears. But on the surface, my
reading is that the message about God's glory continues to be proclaimed by
the universe through the rhythmic transmission of the message from one
generation of day/night to another.
Well, whaddaya expect?
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
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