1 John 2:6

How do I work out the meaning of a Greek text? How can I best understand the forms and vocabulary in this particular text?
Forum rules
This is a beginner's forum - see the Koine Greek forum for more advanced discussion of Greek texts. Please quote the Greek text you are discussing directly in your post if it is reasonably short - do not ask people to look it up.

When answering questions in this forum, keep it simple, and aim your responses to the level of the person asking the question.
David Lim
Posts: 901
Joined: June 6th, 2011, 6:55 am

Re: 1 John 2:6

Post by David Lim »

sccarlson wrote:
David Lim wrote:I think I don't understand your terminology. Besides reported speech or thoughts or feelings, what other kinds of indirect discourse are there? Do you agree that the infinitive in an indirect discourse conveys relative time within the scope of the discourse? What do you mean by "indirect commands and indirect questions"?
Indirect discourse is the reporting of speech in a dependent (or infinitival) clause. The speech reported could be a statement, command, question, etc.

As a result, it was confusing to me when you said
I considered "εν αυτω μενειν" to be an indirect statement rather than an indirect discourse.
That's like saying that you considered someone's pet to be a cat rather than a mammal.
Okay. I see why we misunderstood one another.. I was saying that I considered "εν αυτω μενειν" to be not a reported speech, but rather a statement from the author's point of view concerning what this one said, just as I consider the infinitive together with the accusative in "εν τω" / "μετα το" / "εως του" / "προ του" + inf. + acc. not to be a reported speech. However I think you consider "εν αυτω μενειν" to be reported speech? If so, can you tell me the phrase that was spoken and explain why you think it was actually spoken directly?
sccarlson wrote:I am concerned that my previous attempts to explain have only confused matters more, and, rather than get side-tracked, I'd really like to get back to the source of your distinction between indirect statements and indirect discourse. So I renew my question: What grammar are you using?
The simple answer is, none apart from Funk's Grammar. However I do not just follow it but also draw my own inferences from reading and searching the Greek texts. I used "indirect statement" to refer to complete clauses (sentences) that are converted into an object, which now clearly seems not to be the meaning others associate with it. Is there a proper term for this?
δαυιδ λιμ
Stephen Carlson
Posts: 3351
Joined: May 11th, 2011, 10:51 am
Location: Melbourne
Contact:

Re: 1 John 2:6

Post by Stephen Carlson »

David Lim wrote:Okay. I see why we misunderstood one another.. I was saying that I considered "εν αυτω μενειν" to be not a reported speech, but rather a statement from the author's point of view concerning what this one said, just as I consider the infinitive together with the accusative in "εν τω" / "μετα το" / "εως του" / "προ του" + inf. + acc. not to be a reported speech. However I think you consider "εν αυτω μενειν" to be reported speech? If so, can you tell me the phrase that was spoken and explain why you think it was actually spoken directly?
Well, there's a λέγων that indicates speech. As for whether it was actually spoken, I suppose it could be merely hypothetical, as in this being something that someone would or might say.
David Lim wrote:The simple answer is, none apart from Funk's Grammar. However I do not just follow it but also draw my own inferences from reading and searching the Greek texts. I used "indirect statement" to refer to complete clauses (sentences) that are converted into an object, which now clearly seems not to be the meaning others associate with it. Is there a proper term for this?
Good question. "Subordinate clause" is probably too general for your purpose because they do not have to be verb arguments. A subordinate clause that is a verb argument (e.g. object) is called a "complement clause" but I can't recall off-hand if they may also include infinitive clauses in addition to ὅτι and ἵνα clauses.

Stephen
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
Melbourne, Australia
Post Reply

Return to “What does this text mean?”