ἀπιστία (the range of sense of the alpha privative)

Semantic Range, Lexicography, and other approaches to word meaning - in general, or for particular words.
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Stephen Hughes
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Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

ἀπιστία (the range of sense of the alpha privative)

Post by Stephen Hughes »

The alpha privative (ἄλφα στερητικόν) in (for an example to begin this thread) ἀπιστία (unbelief), seems to be handled in a fairly cut and dry way as having the sense "without faith", "unbelief" - something like an on/off switch. I've been wondering about the sense of alpha-privatives these days, wondering whether they really imply the total absence of <such and so>, or just a reduced (noticeably lacking) ammount of it? For the exemplar ἀπιστία, I have been thinking about 2 things:
  • (1) In Matthew 17:20 (RP) Ὁ δὲ Ἰησοῦς εἶπεν αὐτοῖς, Διὰ τὴν ἀπιστίαν ὑμῶν. Where ἀπιστία is meant in the sense of ὀλιγοπιστία (littleness of faith) it is rendered as such in a some manuscripts, but not all, suggesting that ἀπιστία may not always be meant to convey so totally negative a meaning.

    (2) In the Modern Greek lexica, the alpha-privative does not convey so clear cut an absence of <such and so>. For this exemplar, let me render ἀπιστία from Triandafyllidis into Koine spelling and accents and Imperial Koine restored pronunciation, and just listing the sense that occurs in the NT, ἀπιστία would be something like;
    • ἀπιστία, ἡ [apistía], ἡ ἔλλειψις πίστεως (the shortfall of faith)
    Even though the verb ἐλλείπω occurs only once (in the LXX), to make thing easier and for completeness, let me list an adaptation of ἔλλειψις from Triantafyllides as well - it is also covered well enough in English in ἔλλειψις from Perseus LSJ;
    • ἔλλειψις, ἡ [élipsēs] τὸ μὴ ὑπάρχειν (to not exist), καθ' ὁλοκληρίαν ἢ ἐν μέρει (entirely or in part), τί ἀναγκαίον (anything/something neccessary)
    Which, with its "καθ' ὁλοκληρίαν ἢ ἐν μέρει" suggests that the alpha privative does not carry so clear-cut a sense.
Does anyone have any ideas about this? Is a diachronic thing, that at first the alpha privative was just total absence, but later softened? Is it because we learn it early during the course of our study - when the language is so clear-cut and easy to understand that it seems like that - but really we need to re-visit the issue as more mature language learners?
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Paul-Nitz
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Joined: June 1st, 2011, 4:19 am
Location: Sussex, Wisconsin

Re: ἀπιστία (the range of sense of the alpha privative)

Post by Paul-Nitz »

I haven't looked through these, but I managed to compile a list of Alpha Privative uses in NT, by searching Zerwick:

Matthew 3:12, 8:17, 10:8, 12:36, 14:14, 26:2, 17, Mark 6:5, 14:1, 16:18, Luke 1:4, 3:17, 4:40, 5:15, 7:30, 8:2, 9:2, 10:9, 11:40, 12:20, 13:11, 15:13, 21:9, 24:25, John 4:46, 6:2, 8:7, 11:1, 19:23, Acts 2:36, 4:9, 5:23, 9:37, 12:3, 16:23, 20:6, 21:34, 24:16, 25:26, 26:19, 28:9, Romans 1:31, 2:23, 1 Corinthians 10:32, 11:30, Ephesians 5:17, Philippians 1:10, 3:1, 1 Thessalonians 5:3, 1 Timothy 1:9, 2 Timothy 3:3, Titus 1:6
  • [Taken from references to alpha-privative in Zerwick, M., & Grosvenor, M. (1974). A grammatical analysis of the Greek New Testament (p. 516). Rome: Biblical Institute Press.]
The following quote compares alpha-privative with εν - Seems not to be the "on/off" switch here.

Compounds of ἐν are largely found as antithetic to those in ἀ- privative, which have the meaning without … (lit. having no …). So ἄνομος without law is opposed to ἔννομοβ under law in 1 Co 9:21, ἄτιμος without honour to ἔνδοξος with glory in 1 Co 4:10 (ἔντιμος elsewhere).
  • Moulton, J. H., & Howard, W. F. (1963–). A Grammar of New Testament Greek: Accidence and Word-Formation. (Vol. 2, p. 307). Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark.
α and ευ are put on opposite sides here.

A number of these verbs in -έω were formed from noun compounds having ἀ- privative or εὐ- as a prefix. In addition to those given above, we find in the NT ἀγνοέω (<*α-γνοο-ς, <*γνα-ϝο-ς, cf. Lat. cognitus, <*-gna-to-s, see Brugmann Grd. i. 203; but see above, § 106, p. 281), ἀδικέω (as in class. Gr. both intrans. and trans., whereas † ἐκδικέω (<°κος) is only used transitively…. Ἀκαιρέω (Diod. † -έομαι, N.T. ἁ.λ. Phil 4:11, Herm. Sim. ix. 10:5) is a Hellenistic derivative from the class. ἄκαιρος, opposed to † εὐκαιρέω, which is a good Κοινή word (Polyb., Plut., papp)….. ἀπιστέω, † ἀστατέω and ἀτακτέω. † Εὐαρεστέω is used by Hellenistic writers alone (so °τος can be quoted from inscrr. and papp. in addition to the “bibl. and eccl.” citations. Vocab. s.v.). Εὐνοέω (§ 107, p. 287).
  • Moulton, J. H., & Howard, W. F. (1963–). A Grammar of New Testament Greek: Accidence and Word-Formation. (Vol. 2, p. 390). Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark.
Paul D. Nitz - Lilongwe Malawi
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