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Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 12:33 am
by Mike Burke Deactivated
What's the difference between the prepositions eÍpið and eÍn?

Is there any difference in meaning or usage?

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 4:41 am
by Stephen Carlson
Mike Burke wrote:What's the difference between the prepositions eÍpið and eÍn?

Is there any difference in meaning or usage?
Your Greek font is not coming through and the text is coming across as gibberish. Please use Unicode or a standard (i.e. B-Greek style) transliteration.

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 9:08 am
by Stephen Carlson
[mod note: I have moved this Beginners Forum / Vocabulary as this post does not deal with a specific text.

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 11:08 am
by Mike Burke Deactivated
Thank you.

What's the difference (if there is any difference) between Epi and En?

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 12:17 pm
by Stephen Carlson
Mike Burke wrote:What's the difference (if there is any difference) between Epi and En?
It depends. In some contexts they are as different as the difference between external (upon) and internal (in). In other contexts, not so much.

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 8:33 pm
by David Lim
Stephen Carlson wrote:
Mike Burke wrote:What's the difference (if there is any difference) between Epi and En?
It depends. In some contexts they are as different as the difference between external (upon) and internal (in). In other contexts, not so much.
I would also say that although there is almost always a difference between the prepositions "επι" and "εν", very often even a literal English translation cannot show an obvious distinction unless you analyze the surrounding context, because a large variety of English words have to be used to convey all the different possible usages of "επι". Usually though "εν" means "{ in / among (plural) } (in a location) / in (in reference to / in a period of time ) / { in / by } (by an indirect object). For more detail you should refer to a lexicon (like http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/mor ... ek#lexicon), or simply read more to get familiar with the common words like "επι" and "εν".

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 4th, 2012, 11:53 pm
by Mike Burke Deactivated
David Lim wrote:
Stephen Carlson wrote:
Mike Burke wrote:What's the difference (if there is any difference) between Epi and En?
It depends. In some contexts they are as different as the difference between external (upon) and internal (in). In other contexts, not so much.
I would also say that although there is almost always a difference between the prepositions "επι" and "εν", very often even a literal English translation cannot show an obvious distinction unless you analyze the surrounding context, because a large variety of English words have to be used to convey all the different possible usages of "επι". Usually though "εν" means "{ in / among (plural) } (in a location) / in (in reference to / in a period of time ) / { in / by } (by an indirect object). For more detail you should refer to a lexicon (like http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/mor ... ek#lexicon), or simply read more to get familiar with the common words like "επι" and "εν".
Thank you both.

What about Eis?

Is it used more or less synonymously with En?

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 5th, 2012, 1:49 am
by Stephen Carlson
Hi Mike, the meaning of prepositions is highly context dependent. Sometimes different prepositions have distinct meanings; sometimes they overlap.

Re: Prepositions

Posted: November 5th, 2012, 8:08 am
by Barry Hofstetter
To answer the question a little more specifically, yes, there is a difference between εἰς and ἐν. εἰς is generally used with verbs of motion, ἐν with verbs of rest. During the time of the NT, there has been some semantic shift in the prepositions, and we see them used in ways surprising to someone who knows classical Greek before reading his NT. As Stephen pointed out, the usages of the prepositions are highly context dependent. Sometimes they are used in Greek in ways we wouldn't expect if we look first at the English, and sometimes the semantic range is such that the English demands a different preposition to translate that we don't expect in English. The only way to get a hold of this is to read lots of Greek and see the various prepositions in context. In modern languages, the use of prepositions can be most challenging to the student, and so for ancient languages as well.