From: George Blaisdell (maqhth@hotmail.com)
Date: Sat Aug 11 2001 - 17:43:44 EDT
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George Blaisdell
Roslyn, WA
"Be not troubling of you the heart..."
[From the Gospel of John, Chapter 14, verse 1.]
>From: "Patrick James"
>I think that some examples from Classical Greek and Latin will illustrate
>this use of the present tense, when the surrounding verbs are historic.
>The present tense appears to have been the standard way of quoting,
>paraphrasing or alluding to an author, or perhaps more clearly, his works,
>(ie he is dead, but his testimony says... ") and even rumors.
[Illustrations snipped]
What a helpful understanding - For it goes well beyond the 'dramatic
present', which I always saw as over-dramatized, to a very ordinary way of
thinking about the continuing influence of those no longer alive. To this
very day, for instance, Aristotle is saying "An Aristotelian quote..."
I am remembering [without the citation] John using the present tense of
baptizmo historically after John the Baptist's death, where he writes
something like [and please don't hold me to this!!] "(And He returned to the
river), where John is baptizing", and where clearly this is an historical
present, and it bothered me how it might gramatically work, and perhaps it
means that this is where the baptism of John is still being done. [ie the
baptism of repentance?]
That sure would make things easier and simpler, if true...
geo
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