Barry Hofstetter wrote:Bob Stevens wrote:Stephen Hughes wrote:Do you mean like 1 Samuel 1:13 and Rees Howels? I have no idea about that. I only know a few words of Greek.
Because I haven't had time to get acquainted with your style, your comment about only knowing a few Greek words has me stumped. I am proceeding on the assumption that it is facetious.
Yes, even if he is being honestly humble instead of facetious, Stephen knows more than a few Greek words.
To me the context clearly indicates "hearing with understanding." I suppose you could make an argument that Paul has in mind private prayer, but then that doesn't seem to make sense of the contrast with prophesying. The context seems to be public worship. Can you indicate otherwise?
I mean that I'm more familiar with words than with grammar. I know what all of the words mean severally.
Your question, Bob, is an interesting one, but I don't see that what you are asking about the word ἀκούειν is going to get you an answer about the nature of prayer or church discipline regarding prayer.
From what I understand, what you want to know, has more to do with the
nature of the negatives in Greek than with the meaning of ἀκούειν. Look at the verse:
ὁ γὰρ λαλῶν γλώσσῃ οὐκ ἀνθρώποις λαλεῖ ἀλλὰ θεῷ, οὐδεὶς γὰρ ἀκούει, πνεύματι δὲ λαλεῖ μυστήρια·
Your question is essentially, does οὐκ ἀνθρώποις λαλεῖ ἀλλὰ θεῷ mean ἀνθρώποις οὐκ λαλεῖ ὁ λαλῶν γλώσσῃ ἀλλὰ θεῷ μόνον.? That requires a knowledge of Greek grammar beyond my ability. Then on top of that, the word γὰρ explains the first negative with another negative. The relationship between negative elements in a sentence is not a well undestood area of the language
Your supplimentary question
Bob Stevens wrote:I don't want to belabor the issue, but do you see anything that compels us to amplify the translation beyond simply "hears"? Might not this simply refer to private worship where no one but the speaker and God hear?
Is the hurdle at which I balked at. There are too many brambles on the other side. You are asking if a series of negative statements lead to a positive (or definite) conclusion - the nature of church discipline / practice or the nature of prayer.
Then there is the question of the object of ἀκούειν. If it was οὐδεὶς γὰρ ἀκούει ἃ λαλεῖ, then it would probably be "hear and understand" because others are aware of the speaking. If it were οὐδεὶς γὰρ ἀκούει αὐτοῦ τὴν φωνήν, then it perhaps mean he was alone (κατ' ἰδίαν), but that he had a sound. Aside from Simon and Garfunkel speaking usually has (audible) words. That is said expressly here, with the repeated use of λαλεῖν.
That raises an added consideration of the meaning of λαλεῖν. There are some people who hold that λέγειν expresses the content of what is said and λαλεῖν refers to the sound which carry the content. It sounds like a plausible distinction, but apparently the people who wrote Greek weren't so keenly aware of that distinction. I have ideas about it, but not well formulated ones.
Then there is the consideration of tense / aspect, and how that affects the scale of gradations of meaning in these sort of graded meaning verbs. I have some ideas / obsevations of obvious things about that, but none really worth sharing.
Then there is consideration of the number of οὐδείς. My Greek is not good enough for me to say whether οὐδεὶς ἀκούει is the same as ἄλλοι οὐκ ἀκούουσιν. In fact, I'm not clear whether καθείς should be taken with a negative or positve sense, considering that the Modern Greek negative is expressed by καθένας followed by a verb with a negative particle.
I don't see translation with more than one word as amplification, but choice of a suitable meaning. Let's take a few examples
Matthew 2:22 wrote:Ἀκούσας δὲ ὅτι Ἀρχέλαος βασιλεύει ἐπὶ τῆς Ἰουδαίας ἀντὶ Ἡρῴδου τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ, ἐφοβήθη ἐκεῖ ἀπελθεῖν· χρηματισθεὶς δὲ κατ’ ὄναρ, ἀνεχώρησεν εἰς τὰ μέρη τῆς Γαλιλαίας,
This is a fairly strong meaning of ἀκούειν, like, "heard and understood (the implications)", which is a different type of understanding.
John 10:3 wrote:Τούτῳ ὁ θυρωρὸς ἀνοίγει, καὶ τὰ πρόβατα τῆς φωνῆς αὐτοῦ ἀκούει, καὶ τὰ ἴδια πρόβατα καλεῖ κατ’ ὄνομα, καὶ ἐξάγει αὐτά.
Here, ἀκούειν probably means "to hear the sound of" (his voice).
Acts 11:7 wrote:Ἤκουσα δὲ φωνῆς λεγούσης μοι, Ἀναστάς, Πέτρε, θῦσον καὶ φάγε.
Here it probably means, "to hear distinct words". Another thing here is that he didn't eat raw meat! θύειν doesn't mean "to kill", it means "to kill and BBQ".
I'm not "facetious" or flippant, (or humble - which means different things to different people). I followed all the lines of reasoning that you can now see expressed, and saw that my (limited) knowledge of the language, I would not be of much help with either the question you are asking or the one that I think you should be asking. The best that I could offer - the only thing that I know, which could help you with, is to call to your attention the gradation of meaning for the verb. The other things are outside the present scope of my knowledge of Greek. I didn't want to bore you with my uncertainties and unresolved questions. The comment that I only know a few words was made after the realisation of the extent of my ignorance - if it is possible for a thing that does not in fact exist to have an extent.