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Which verb does this phrase modify?

Posted: January 24th, 2017, 9:19 pm
by dougknighton
James 1:21 διὸ ἀποθέμενοι πᾶσαν ῥυπαρίαν καὶ περισσείαν κακίας ἐν πραΰτητι δέξασθε τὸν ἔμφυτον λόγον τὸν δυνάμενον σῶσαι τὰς ψυχὰς ὑμῶν.

In all the English translations I've seen, the phrase ἐν πραΰτητι is usually associated with the following imperative (δέξασθε). However, the Nestle-Aland 27h edition places a comma after πραΰτητι, thereby (I think) associating it with the preceding participle (ἀποθέμενοι). Is there some particular rule or principle which points us in the right direction, or is this just a hermeneutical decision?

Re: Which verb does this phrase modify?

Posted: January 24th, 2017, 11:15 pm
by S Walch
I think the comma maybe influenced by the Textual Difference indicated in the footnotes, where two manuscripts insert σοφίας after πραΰτητι (cf James 3:13), which I can see as possibly associating it with ἀποθέμενοι rather than δέξασθε, though I don't see anything that would mean that ἐν πραΰτητι σοφίας shouldn't still be associated with δέξασθε.

NA28th edition doesn't have the comma any more in the text (at least online). NA26th also has the comma, as does UBS4.

Re: Which verb does this phrase modify?

Posted: January 26th, 2017, 5:19 am
by Tony Pope
This has been discussed before on this forum http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek/forum/vie ... F%84%CE%B9.

For the change from NA27 to NA28, and an opinion expressed on the opposite side to the English translations, see http://evangelicaltextualcriticism.blog ... nt-in.html

It is, as you suggest, a matter of interpretation as to which option fits the context better.

Re: Which verb does this phrase modify?

Posted: January 26th, 2017, 7:52 pm
by dougknighton
Thanks, Tony, for the reference to the earlier discussion. It was helpful ... I find searching for those on this forum difficult because we seem to need the exact spelling of a word--including accents. Wish we could search for text references, such as "James 1:21" But the search engine won't allow that.