Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Paul Rittman
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Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Paul Rittman »

Has anyone examined instances of the Granville Sharp rule in the LXX, or even, extra-biblical literature? Is it unique to koine Greek, or a certain era? Has it been found operative in earlier Greek writers, such as Herodotus or Homer?
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Jason Hare »

Hi, Paul. Welcome to the forum. Just wanted to let you know that I deleted the duplicate thread. Everything should be in order now. There may be a few more posts that you need to make and have approved before you'll have full posting privileges. It's a safety procedure against spam.

I don't have information to answer your question, so I'll let the thread go on. If you have any problems, don't hesitate to turn to one of the moderators - and you can always reach me at the e-mail address that I contacted you through.

Best of luck!

Jason
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Mark Lightman
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Mark Lightman »

Hi, Paul,

I am going to answer the easy part of your question first.
Has it been found operative in earlier Greek writers, such as Herodotus or Homer?
Homer almost never uses the article the way it is used in the Greek NT, so the rule won't work or not work in Homeric Greek.

Now, having answered that part of your question, I hereby PUNT. :mrgreen:
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Dan Wallace has written a monograph on this rule. I recommend getting a hold of his book first and checking it. It really is the place to go for more than you can imagine about this construction.

If I recall correctly, he states that Clement of Alexandria and some other patristics do not follow this rule.

Stephen
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Louis L Sorenson
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Louis L Sorenson »

We should clarify what Granville-Sharp states: (This information is taken from http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... pQ&cad=rja

The original Granville Sharp (1798)


When the copulative καί connects two nouns of the same case, [viz. nouns (either substantive or adjective, or
participles) of personal description, respecting office, dignity, affinity, or connexion, (sic) and attributes,
properties, or qualities, good or ill,] if the article ὁ, or any of its cases, precedes the first of the said nouns or
participles, and is not repeated before the second noun or participle, the latter always relates to the same person
that is expressed or described by the first noun or participle.2
This was further clarified by subsequent grammarians. Daniel Wallace gives the following definition:
In native Greek constructions (i.e., not translation Greek), when a single article modifies two substantives
connected by καί (thus, article -substantive—καὶ -substantive), when both substantives are (1) singular (both
grammatically and semantically), (2) personal, (3) and common nouns (not proper names or ordinals), they have
the same referent.
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by MAubrey »

sccarlson wrote:Dan Wallace has written a monograph on this rule. I recommend getting a hold of his book first and checking it. It really is the place to go for more than you can imagine about this construction.

If I recall correctly, he states that Clement of Alexandria and some other patristics do not follow this rule.

Stephen
That's not exactly right. More accurately, there are a handful (24) of instances in the church fathers where the rule doesn't work. That particular section in Wallace's book (267-272) is what you'd be interested in there, but it should be emphasized that this particular discussion is in the "exegetical implications" section, *not* the linguistic analysis section. That particular section concludes: "Overall we have noticed that the use of the article in the Nt is not out of step with its use in Attic [i.e. Classical] and hellenistic Greek" (Wallace 2009: 181).
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Stephen Carlson
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Stephen Carlson »

MAubrey wrote:
sccarlson wrote:If I recall correctly, he states that Clement of Alexandria and some other patristics do not follow this rule.
That's not exactly right. More accurately, there are a handful (24) of instances in the church fathers where the rule doesn't work.
I don't want to get into a tomayto-tomahto issue, but I had forgotten from my reading of his book a year ago that there were so many "exceptions."

Stephen
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Paul Rittman
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Paul Rittman »

Thanks for the reference to that book.

OK in the back of that book is an appendix listing 79 (and a few more that evidently weren't counted, on page 295?) instances in the Greek New Testament where these constructions occured, and are properly translated according to that rule.

From his book itself: "Remarkably, we have found this rule to be substantialy correct, both within the NT and outside." (p. 279)

As far as the 24 instances, Wallace mentions six categories of examples (lists of more than two nouns, when an ordinal numbers is attached to one of the nouns, etc.); Wallace also mentioned one specific category. "In a few patristic writers, particularly of the second and third centuries, we read of "the Father and Son" or similar expressions in a TSKS construction... But the fact that all such patristic violations of Sharp's rule spoke of members of the Trinity,... and that the same writers elsewhere gave ample evidence of writing in conformity to the semantics of Sharp's rule, suggests that this exception is not really an exception." (p. 281) Then he goes on to discuss the difference between "person" and "being", the formula from the Nicene and Chalcedonian confessions. Not having read the book, it appears that he wasn't exactly saying that Clement et al. didn't follow this rule, but that they typically did, but occasionally (or perhaps even every time), when referring to the Trinity, would not.

OK so it does appear to be followed generally, within and without the Greek NT, although some categories of exceptions do exist. Is that an accurate enough statement?
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by MAubrey »

Paul Rittman wrote:Thanks for the reference to that book.

OK in the back of that book is an appendix listing 79 (and a few more that evidently weren't counted, on page 295?) instances in the Greek New Testament where these constructions occured, and are properly translated according to that rule.

From his book itself: "Remarkably, we have found this rule to be substantialy correct, both within the NT and outside." (p. 279)

As far as the 24 instances, Wallace mentions six categories of examples (lists of more than two nouns, when an ordinal numbers is attached to one of the nouns, etc.); Wallace also mentioned one specific category. "In a few patristic writers, particularly of the second and third centuries, we read of "the Father and Son" or similar expressions in a TSKS construction... But the fact that all such patristic violations of Sharp's rule spoke of members of the Trinity,... and that the same writers elsewhere gave ample evidence of writing in conformity to the semantics of Sharp's rule, suggests that this exception is not really an exception." (p. 281) Then he goes on to discuss the difference between "person" and "being", the formula from the Nicene and Chalcedonian confessions. Not having read the book, it appears that he wasn't exactly saying that Clement et al. didn't follow this rule, but that they typically did, but occasionally (or perhaps even every time), when referring to the Trinity, would not.

OK so it does appear to be followed generally, within and without the Greek NT, although some categories of exceptions do exist. Is that an accurate enough statement?
In a word: Yes.
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Vasileios Tsialas
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Re: Examples of the Granville Sharp rule outside the NT

Post by Vasileios Tsialas »

It is a logical tendency in the Greek language, not an absolute rule. It cannot be an absolute rule when it has exceptions, when it is so complicated in order to avoid (unsuccessfully) exceptions; it cannot be an absolute rule in a developing lingua franca spoken mostly by multinational groups, and when it overlooks overwhelming historical data in the case of theology.
Vasileios Tsialas

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