1 Clement 34.3

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Alan Patterson
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1 Clement 34.3

Post by Alan Patterson »

προλέγει γὰρ ἡμῖν· Ἰδοὺ ὁ κύριος, καὶ ὁ μισθὸς αὐτοῦ πρὸ προσώπου αὐτοῦ, ἀποδοῦναι ἕκάστῳ κατὰ τὸ ἔργον αὐτοῦ.

Every translation I find on this verse takes the words Ἰδοὺ ὁ κύριος as "Behold, the Lord comes..."

Is this a common usage that we would expect such an omission?
χαρις υμιν και ειρηνη,
Alan Patterson
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by Stirling Bartholomew »

Alan Patterson wrote:προλέγει γὰρ ἡμῖν· Ἰδοὺ ὁ κύριος, καὶ ὁ μισθὸς αὐτοῦ πρὸ προσώπου αὐτοῦ, ἀποδοῦναι ἕκάστῳ κατὰ τὸ ἔργον αὐτοῦ.

Every translation I find on this verse takes the words Ἰδοὺ ὁ κύριος as "Behold, the Lord comes..."

Is this a common usage that we would expect such an omission?
Alan,

Ἰδοὺ + name/title is an idiom for introductions and announcements of arrivals. The verb may be explicit or implicit. Translations often make explicit in the target language something which is implicit in the source language.
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Stephen Carlson
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by Stephen Carlson »

How many independent translations of 1 Clement are there anyway?
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Stirling Bartholomew
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by Stirling Bartholomew »

Stirling Bartholomew wrote: Ἰδοὺ + name/title is an idiom for introductions and announcements of arrivals. The verb may be explicit or implicit. Translations often make explicit in the target language something which is implicit in the source language.
here is an example or two with an explicit verb.

Matt. 28:9 καὶ ἰδοὺ Ἰησοῦς ὑπήντησεν αὐταῖς λέγων· χαίρετε.

Dan. 10:13 καὶ ὁ στρατηγὸς βασιλέως Περσῶν ἀνθειστήκει ἐναντίον μου εἴκοσι καὶ μίαν ἡμέραν, καὶ ἰδοὺ Μιχαηλ εἷς τῶν ἀρχόντων τῶν πρώτων ἐπῆλθε βοηθῆσαί μοι, καὶ αὐτὸν ἐκεῖ κατέλιπον μετὰ τοῦ στρατηγοῦ τοῦ βασιλέως Περσῶν.
C. Stirling Bartholomew
Alan Patterson
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by Alan Patterson »

Thanks for the help.

I did check 3 more translations Lightfoot, Holle, and Roberts-Donaldson. They have:

Behold, the Lord, and His reward is before His face, to recompense each man according to his work.

Behold the Lord cometh, and his reward is before his face, to give to every one according to his work.

Behold, the Lord [cometh], and His reward is before His face, to render to every man according to his work.


Finally, Michael Holmes has: Behold, the Lord comes, and his reward is with him...

So, I have to retract my statement that most have "comes." But, thanks for the Ἰδοὺ + name/title.
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Alan Patterson
MAubrey
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by MAubrey »

Alan, if you're interested in reading up on the functions of ἰδού, including this construction, Nick Bailey's dissertation discusses it in detail in chapter 6:

http://dare.ubvu.vu.nl/handle/1871/15504

A more accurate translation (in terms of English semantic/pragmatic equivalence) would be: "Here comes the Lord" or "Here is the Lord." The use of ἰδοὺ as a deictic presentational with a noun phrase, is actually the most basic use ἰδοὺ has.
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Louis L Sorenson
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by Louis L Sorenson »

Mike Aubrey wrote:
A more accurate translation (in terms of English semantic/pragmatic equivalence) would be: "Here comes the Lord" or "Here is the Lord." The use of ἰδοὺ as a deictic presentational with a noun phrase, is actually the most basic use ἰδοὺ has.
Mike, could you expound on the term 'deictic presentaional' for those of us who are not intimate with modern linguistic jargon. You could even make a separate post on the 'deictic center' or such, that would be helpful.
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Re: 1 Clement 34.3

Post by MAubrey »

Louis L Sorenson wrote:Mike Aubrey wrote:
A more accurate translation (in terms of English semantic/pragmatic equivalence) would be: "Here comes the Lord" or "Here is the Lord." The use of ἰδοὺ as a deictic presentational with a noun phrase, is actually the most basic use ἰδοὺ has.
Mike, could you expound on the term 'deictic presentaional' for those of us who are not intimate with modern linguistic jargon. You could even make a separate post on the 'deictic center' or such, that would be helpful.
Well, "deictic center" is a concept not relevant here and tends to be used only with reference to tenses and even then it isn't one I use.

As to the term deictic presentational, this particular set of linguistic jargon is fairly straight forward:

deictic = point
presentational = that which presents something

In English, we use the demonstratives here and there for a number of things, but one important use is to point out new participants/entities in a text that haven't been mentioned before (e.g. Here's Harry with our take out). Ἰδοὺ and ἴδε function in the same manner. Chapter 6 of the dissertation I linked to is very helpful here.
Mike Aubrey, Linguist
SIL International
Koine-Greek.com
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