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Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 17th, 2011, 8:28 am
by Rick Glau
I came across this quote in Bullingers "Figures of Speech", and cannot make sense of it. Perhaps I am missing something obvious in my ignorance...hoping you can help.

" ...here comes the matter of punctuation. In Rom.8:34 we have a very similiar construction, which if we treat it as 1 Cor. 15:29 is treated in the A.V. and R.V.., would read thus, "Who is he that condemneth Christ that died? But the question is made to end at the word "condemneth," and the Ellipsis of the verb substantive is supplied thus: Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died"...

I understand the problems with 1 Cor.15:29, that is not my issue. My question is how can Bullinger translate 8:34(a) as if Christ is the object of the participle and should therefore be in the accusative case, when in EVERY text I have found it remains in the nominative, making his translation at best defective on it's face. What don't I see?

Also, this is my first post on the new board. I haven't figured out how to use the greek font yet. Sorry. I have lurked here on/off for a long time. Thanks for the education along the way.

Rick

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 17th, 2011, 10:47 am
by Stephen Carlson
Rick Glau wrote:Also, this is my first post on the new board. I haven't figured out how to use the greek font yet. Sorry. I have lurked here on/off for a long time. Thanks for the education along the way.
Questions about the Greek text are almost impossible to discuss without the actual Greek text. Here is the text for Rom 8:34
Rom 8:34 wrote:τίς ὁ κατακρινῶν; Χριστὸς Ἰησοῦς ὁ ἀποθανών, μᾶλλον δὲ ἐγερθείς, ὃς καί ἐστιν ἐν δεξιᾷ τοῦ θεοῦ, ὃς καὶ ἐντυγχάνει ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν.
It is hard to tell what Bullinger is doing on p. 43 of his text (please cite page numbers of books you quote--this one wasn't in his index and it took me a while to find it). He's not very clear. I am wondering whether it would have been acceptable in accordance with the punctuation use of over a century ago to drop a comma between condemneth and Christ.

Stephen

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 17th, 2011, 11:39 am
by Eeli Kaikkonen
Stephen Carlson wrote: (please cite page numbers of books you quote--this one wasn't in his index and it took me a while to find it).
Stephen
+1

But to me it looks like Bullinger meant that "Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died" is the correct rendering, and "Christ" is then nominative. Notice the "which if we treat it as 1 Cor. 15:29 is treated in the A.V. and R.V.., would read thus" and "But". He then goes on to treat 1Cor 15:29 grammatically similarly than Rom 8:34 is treated everywhere, which is his point.

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 17th, 2011, 10:57 pm
by Rick Glau
Thank you for your replies.

It seems to me that Bullinger (E.W. Bullinger, Figures of Spech Used in the Bible, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1968, pp.43-44) is arguing for an alternate punctuation of the Corinthian verse, by an appeal to a very similiar (his words) construction in the Romans passage. The commonly accepted punctuation of the said verses from UBS 4, Nestles, etc, is as follows:

1 Cor.15:29(a)...Ἐπεὶ τί ποιήσουσιν οἱ βαπτιζόμενοι ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν;
Rom. 8:34(a)...τίς ὁ κατακρινῶν; Χριστὸς [Ἰησοῦς] ὁ ἀποθανών,

Bullinger is saying to punctuate 1 Cor.15:29 this way - "Ἐπεὶ τί ποιήσουσιν οἱ βαπτιζόμενοι; ( )ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν.", with a period after βαπτιζόμενοι, and supplying the ellipsis It is before ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν.
His argument may or may not make sense from a theological point of view, but the theology of this verse is not the issue at hand.
He says to punctuate it this way because Rom.8:34 is punctuated similiarly i.e., with the period after "τίς ὁ κατακρινῶν." All would agree here. The problem is this verse could not be alternately punctuated as he suggests, " τίς ὁ κατακρινῶν Χριστὸς [Ἰησοῦς] ὁ ἀποθανών," removing the period after "τίς ὁ κατακρινῶν" and making Χριστὸς the object of that participle, because Χριστὸς is nominative in every text I have found. To punctuate it as he suggests to legitimize his argument for the same punctuation in 1 Cor., Χριστὸς would have to be in the accusative. His punctuation for 1 Cor. may make sense, but it cannot be justified grammatically by an appeal to Rom.8:34. Unless the nominative can be shown to be used in this way, it is a false argument. That my issue with this whole thing.
Thank you for bearing with this tedious logic. If anyone cares to wade through this, I would appreciate your comments.
Rick

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 18th, 2011, 2:06 am
by David Lim
Rick Glau wrote:Bullinger is saying to punctuate 1 Cor.15:29 this way - "Ἐπεὶ τί ποιήσουσιν οἱ βαπτιζόμενοι; ( )ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν.", with a period after βαπτιζόμενοι, and supplying the ellipsis It is before ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν.
1 Cor 15:29 clearly has "υπερ των νεκρων" modifying "βαπτιζομενοι", otherwise the second part of the sentence with exactly the same construction will not make sense. Also, are there really ellipses of such a kind as claimed, where an adverbial clause is immediately following a verb and the verb for the adverbial clause is actually missing?

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 18th, 2011, 4:23 am
by Eeli Kaikkonen
Rick Glau wrote: Thank you for bearing with this tedious logic. If anyone cares to wade through this, I would appreciate your comments.
Rick
I think we understand Bullinger similarly. Your "issue with this whole thing" was insightful, as was David Lim's last comment.

The problem with Bullinger is that he throws in quite many comments without real evidence to back it up. The book is great in general (simply because nobody has written a better one), but every detail is under suspicion.

Re: Case agreement, or not? Rom. 8:34

Posted: December 18th, 2011, 5:22 pm
by Rick Glau
Thanks for the comments. Corroboration is always a good thing. I always assume I am wrong when dealing with a "standard" like Bullinger. Just goes to show you, every man is fallible.
Rick