I haven't heard that TETELESTAI was used with that particular sense as a
"paid" marker, but it wouldn't surprise me if it were true. A common
classical idiom was LUEIN TELOS, "to pay off/satisfy a debt" and there's
another idiomatic 3rd sg. impersonal, LUSITELEI from a fusion of the two
elements of that expression, LUSITELEW: LUSITELEI means "it is profitable,"
"it pays." The TETELESTAI of John's gospel, however, is a perfect passive
3d sg. meaning literally, "It has been completed." What has been completed?
Presumably "the work" that Jesus was given to do (cf. John 17:4). But one
might question whether John's soteriology is fully in harmony with a notion
of paying off a debt as a ransom; the image of Jesus as a Passover lamb
belongs to John's gospel, and to be sure, the death of Jesus on the cross
is salvific, but the question whether JOHN's gospel conceives of that death
as paying a ransom is hard to find evidence WITHIN JOHN'S GOSPEL to
support, in my opinion. We've got to be careful in responding to this one,
as it will be difficult to stay away from hermeneutic assumptions when what
we're really after is the precise sense and intent of TETELESTAI in John
19.30.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad@yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/