1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Forum rules
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. This is not a beginner's forum, competence in Greek is assumed.
Erik Peterson
Posts: 3
Joined: September 25th, 2014, 11:08 pm

1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Erik Peterson »

I am writing with a question about 1 John 5:16:

16 ἐάν τις ἴδῃ τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτάνοντα ἁμαρτίαν μὴ πρὸς θάνατον, αἰτήσει, καὶ δώσει αὐτῷ ζωήν, τοῖς ἁμαρτάνουσιν μὴ πρὸς θάνατον. ἔστιν ἁμαρτία πρὸς θάνατον· οὐ περὶ ἐκείνης λέγω ἵνα ἐρωτήσῃ.

In 15a, the present participle of hamartano (ἁμαρτάνοντα) is used. My question concerns the linguistic possibilities of Greek - would it be linguistically possible in Koine Greek to use the aorist (hamartesanta) in this verse if the author intended a different meaning?

My assumption is that there are no restrictions on the pairing of horao with this participle or any others, and that the use of the aorist of hamartano would carry a punctual rather than durative meaning, roughly speaking.

Any help is appreciated. I am restricting this question to the very basic possibilties of this verse. Anyone who wants to expand the discussion is welcome.
Barry Hofstetter
Posts: 2159
Joined: May 6th, 2011, 1:48 pm

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

Erik Peterson wrote:I am writing with a question about 1 John 5:16:

16 ἐάν τις ἴδῃ τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτάνοντα ἁμαρτίαν μὴ πρὸς θάνατον, αἰτήσει, καὶ δώσει αὐτῷ ζωήν, τοῖς ἁμαρτάνουσιν μὴ πρὸς θάνατον. ἔστιν ἁμαρτία πρὸς θάνατον· οὐ περὶ ἐκείνης λέγω ἵνα ἐρωτήσῃ.

In 15a, the present participle of hamartano (ἁμαρτάνοντα) is used. My question concerns the linguistic possibilities of Greek - would it be linguistically possible in Koine Greek to use the aorist (hamartesanta) in this verse if the author intended a different meaning?

My assumption is that there are no restrictions on the pairing of horao with this participle or any others, and that the use of the aorist of hamartano would carry a punctual rather than durative meaning, roughly speaking.

Any help is appreciated. I am restricting this question to the very basic possibilties of this verse. Anyone who wants to expand the discussion is welcome.
Rather odd question. Yes, using the aorist participle rather than the present would change the meaning. It would mean that the action of the participle would be antecedent to that of the main verb rather than concurrent with it.
N.E. Barry Hofstetter, M.A., Th.M.
Ph.D. Student U of FL
Instructor of Latin
Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy
καὶ σὺ τὸ σὸν ποιήσεις κἀγὼ τὸ ἐμόν. ἆρον τὸ σὸν καὶ ὕπαγε.
Stephen Hughes
Posts: 3323
Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Stephen Hughes »

Erik Peterson wrote:My assumption is that there are no restrictions on the pairing of horao (ὁράω) with this participle or any others, and that the use of the aorist of hamartano (ἁμαρτάνω) would carry a punctual rather than durative meaning, roughly speaking.
This may not be a sound assumption to make. This syntactic pattern that these verb take seems to be with a present participle.

As a matter of course, ὁράω is used with a present participle (or a perfect expressing a currently perceivable ongoing state (Matthew 11:8 and various other places)) because in a verb of sensory perception needs to happen at the same time as the thing perceived does, unless the authour wants to make it clear that the sensory perception (sight) of the person doing the action had stopped (Mark 5:32, I don't think it is significant in the case of the passives, because passsives are viewed as punctiliar for intrinsic reasons, eg. Matthew 24:15).

If this was changed to an aorist, it would move the seeing (perception) just to the sinner - implying that a person could be a ἁμαρτωλός even when not actually in the act of sinning (cf. ἄδικος), that the person was not sinning at the time they were seen - and moved the sinners sinning into the intellect (inc. memory) of the person.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Stephen Hughes
Posts: 3323
Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Re: Must a participle have a finite main verb?

Post by Stephen Hughes »

Jonathan Robie wrote:There are 17 instances of non-finite forms of ὁράω as the main verb, the participle seems to be relative to the time of seeing. For instance:
Matthew 14:26 wrote:ἰδόντες δὲ αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης περιπατοῦντα
The present tense περιπατοῦντα should be interpreted with respect to ἰδόντες - they saw Jesus walking around.
Matthew 18:31 wrote:ἰδόντες οὖν οἱ σύνδουλοι αὐτοῦ τὰ γενόμενα
The aorist γενόμενα should be interpreted with respect to ἰδόντες - they saw what had happened.

I have 391 results along these lines, some aren't actually relevant, and I think I'm missing some examples that I can find by improving my query, but let's start here before I put more work into it. Am I interpreting these examples correctly?
Stephen Hughes in the [url=http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2759&p=17368#p17368]Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?[/url] thread wrote:
Erik Peterson wrote:My assumption is that there are no restrictions on the pairing of horao (ὁράω) with this participle or any others, and that the use of the aorist of hamartano (ἁμαρτάνω) would carry a punctual rather than durative meaning, roughly speaking.
This may not be a sound assumption to make. This syntactic pattern that these verb take seems to be with a present participle.

As a matter of course, ὁράω is used with a present participle (or a perfect expressing a currently perceivable ongoing state (Matthew 11:8 and various other places)) because in a verb of sensory perception needs to happen at the same time as the thing perceived does, unless the authour wants to make it clear that the sensory perception (sight) of the person doing the action had stopped (Mark 5:32, I don't think it is significant in the case of the passives, because passsives are viewed as punctiliar for intrinsic reasons, eg. Matthew 24:15).

If this was changed to an aorist, it would move the seeing (perception) just to the sinner - implying that a person could be a ἁμαρτωλός even when not actually in the act of sinning (cf. ἄδικος), that the person was not sinning at the time they were seen - and moved the sinners sinning into the intellect (inc. memory) of the person.
Could you search to see whether the verb ὁράω is ever taken with the aorist of other verbs?
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Jonathan Robie
Posts: 4166
Joined: May 5th, 2011, 5:34 pm
Location: Durham, NC
Contact:

Re: Must a participle have a finite main verb?

Post by Jonathan Robie »

Stephen Hughes wrote:Could you search to see whether the verb ὁράω is ever taken with the aorist of other verbs?
I moved this to the current thread because in 1 John 5:16, ὁράω is finite. So I take it you are looking for aorist participles where the main verb is ὁράω? I did a quick query to ask that question and put the result in a PDF, which is attached.
ὁράω.pdf
(61.08 KiB) Downloaded 116 times
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Andrew Chapman
Posts: 265
Joined: February 5th, 2013, 5:04 am
Location: Oxford, England
Contact:

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Andrew Chapman »

Jonathan Robie wrote: So I take it you are looking for aorist participles where the main verb is ὁράω? I did a quick query to ask that question and put the result in a PDF, which is attached.
I had a look through these and found three where the participle is modifying the object of ὁράω:

ἰδόντες οὖν οἱ σύνδουλοι αὐτοῦ τὰ γενόμενα ἐλυπήθησαν σφόδρα καὶ ἐλθόντες διεσάφησαν τῷ κυρίῳ ἑαυτῶν πάντα τὰ γενόμενα. [Matthew 18.31]

Ἰδὼν δὲ ὁ ἑκατοντάρχης τὸ γενόμενον ἐδόξαζεν τὸν θεὸν λέγων· ὄντως ὁ ἄνθρωπος οὗτος δίκαιος ἦν. [Luke 23.47]

Ἐν οἷς πορευόμενος εἰς τὴν Δαμασκὸν μετ’ ἐξουσίας καὶ ἐπιτροπῆς τῆς τῶν ἀρχιερέων ἡμέρας μέσης κατὰ τὴν ὁδὸν εἶδον, βασιλεῦ, οὐρανόθεν ὑπὲρ τὴν λαμπρότητα τοῦ ἡλίου περιλάμψαν με φῶς καὶ τοὺς σὺν ἐμοὶ πορευομένους. [Acts 16.12-13]

I suppose τὸ γενόμενον might be considered sui generis, so perhaps the last one is the most pertinent. ειδον φως περιλαμξαν με . . .

Andrew
Stephen Hughes
Posts: 3323
Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Stephen Hughes »

Andrew Chapman wrote:
Jonathan Robie wrote: So I take it you are looking for aorist participles where the main verb is ὁράω? I did a quick query to ask that question and put the result in a PDF, which is attached.
I had a look through these and found ... where the participle is modifying the object of ὁράω:
...
Ἐν οἷς πορευόμενος εἰς τὴν Δαμασκὸν μετ’ ἐξουσίας καὶ ἐπιτροπῆς τῆς τῶν ἀρχιερέων ἡμέρας μέσης κατὰ τὴν ὁδὸν εἶδον, βασιλεῦ, οὐρανόθεν ὑπὲρ τὴν λαμπρότητα τοῦ ἡλίου περιλάμψαν με φῶς καὶ τοὺς σὺν ἐμοὶ πορευομένους. [Acts [2]6.12-13]

... perhaps the last one is the most pertinent. ειδον φως περιλαμξαν με . . .
Presumably Acts 26:13 was a special case stressing that it was a sudden flash of light.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Andrew Chapman
Posts: 265
Joined: February 5th, 2013, 5:04 am
Location: Oxford, England
Contact:

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Andrew Chapman »

Stephen Hughes wrote:Presumably Acts 26:13 was a special case stressing that it was a sudden flash of light.
Most of the English translations have 'shining', or 'which shone', but the New Century Version has 'It was brighter than the sun and flashed all around me'.

Andrew
Stephen Hughes
Posts: 3323
Joined: February 26th, 2013, 7:12 am

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Stephen Hughes »

The verb βλέπειν seems similar. Present participle seems to be the rule and something like this relative clause:
Colossians 4:17 wrote:Καὶ εἴπατε Ἀρχίππῳ, Βλέπε τὴν διακονίαν ἣν παρέλαβες ἐν κυρίῳ, ἵνα αὐτὴν πληροῖς.
is in the aorist because the it was received all at once.

The other examples I could find are all with a present participle (I probably needn't quote them all here, but...):
Matthew 15:31 wrote:ὥστε τοὺς ὄχλους θαυμάσαι, βλέποντας κωφοὺς λαλοῦντας, κυλλοὺς ὑγιεῖς, χωλοὺς περιπατοῦντας, καὶ τυφλοὺς βλέποντας· καὶ ἐδόξασαν τὸν θεὸν Ἰσραήλ.
Mark 5:31 wrote:Καὶ ἔλεγον αὐτῷ οἱ μαθηταὶ αὐτοῦ, Βλέπεις τὸν ὄχλον συνθλίβοντά σε, καὶ λέγεις, Τίς μου ἥψατο;
Luke 24:12 (Byz.) wrote:Ὁ δὲ Πέτρος ἀναστὰς ἔδραμεν ἐπὶ τὸ μνημεῖον, καὶ παρακύψας βλέπει τὰ ὀθόνια κείμενα μόνα· καὶ ἀπῆλθεν πρὸς ἑαυτὸν θαυμάζων τὸ γεγονός.
John 1:29 wrote:Τῇ ἐπαύριον βλέπει τὸν Ἰησοῦν ἐρχόμενον πρὸς αὐτόν, καὶ λέγει, Ἴδε ὁ ἀμνὸς τοῦ θεοῦ, ὁ αἴρων τὴν ἁμαρτίαν τοῦ κόσμου.
John 5:19 wrote:Ἀπεκρίνατο οὖν ὁ Ἰησοῦς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς, Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, οὐ δύναται ὁ υἱὸς ποιεῖν ἀφ’ ἑαυτοῦ οὐδέν, ἐὰν μή τι βλέπῃ τὸν πατέρα ποιοῦντα· ἃ γὰρ ἂν ἐκεῖνος ποιῇ, ταῦτα καὶ ὁ υἱὸς ὁμοίως ποιεῖ.
John 20:1 wrote:Τῇ δὲ μιᾷ τῶν σαββάτων Μαρία ἡ Μαγδαληνὴ ἔρχεται πρωΐ, σκοτίας ἔτι οὔσης, εἰς τὸ μνημεῖον, καὶ βλέπει τὸν λίθον ἠρμένον ἐκ τοῦ μνημείου.
John 20:5 wrote:καὶ παρακύψας βλέπει κείμενα τὰ ὀθόνια, οὐ μέντοι εἰσῆλθεν.
John 21:9 wrote:Ὡς οὖν ἀπέβησαν εἰς τὴν γῆν, βλέπουσιν ἀνθρακιὰν κειμένην καὶ ὀψάριον ἐπικείμενον, καὶ ἄρτον.
John 21:20 wrote:Ἐπιστραφεὶς δὲ ὁ Πέτρος βλέπει τὸν μαθητὴν ὃν ἠγάπα ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἀκολουθοῦντα, ὃς καὶ ἀνέπεσεν ἐν τῷ δείπνῳ ἐπὶ τὸ στῆθος αὐτοῦ καὶ εἶπεν, Κύριε, τίς ἐστιν ὁ παραδιδούς σε;
Acts 4:14 wrote:Τὸν δὲ ἄνθρωπον βλέποντες σὺν αὐτοῖς ἑστῶτα τὸν τεθεραπευμένον, οὐδὲν εἶχον ἀντειπεῖν.
Acts 8:6 wrote:Προσεῖχόν τε οἱ ὄχλοι τοῖς λεγομένοις ὑπὸ τοῦ Φιλίππου ὁμοθυμαδόν, ἐν τῷ ἀκούειν αὐτοὺς καὶ βλέπειν τὰ σημεῖα ἃ ἐποίει.
Romans 7:23 wrote:βλέπω δὲ ἕτερον νόμον ἐν τοῖς μέλεσίν μου ἀντιστρατευόμενον τῷ νόμῳ τοῦ νοός μου, καὶ αἰχμαλωτίζοντά με τῷ νόμῳ τῆς ἁμαρτίας τῷ ὄντι ἐν τοῖς μέλεσίν μου.
1Corinthians 3:10 wrote:Κατὰ τὴν χάριν τοῦ θεοῦ τὴν δοθεῖσάν μοι, ὡς σοφὸς ἀρχιτέκτων θεμέλιον τέθεικα, ἄλλος δὲ ἐποικοδομεῖ. Ἕκαστος δὲ βλεπέτω πῶς ἐποικοδομεῖ.
1Corinthians 10:18 wrote:Βλέπετε τὸν Ἰσραὴλ κατὰ σάρκα· οὐχὶ οἱ ἐσθίοντες τὰς θυσίας κοινωνοὶ τοῦ θυσιαστηρίου εἰσίν;
Hebrews 2:9 wrote:Τὸν δὲ βραχύ τι παρ’ ἀγγέλους ἠλαττωμένον βλέπομεν Ἰησοῦν, διὰ τὸ πάθημα τοῦ θανάτου δόξῃ καὶ τιμῇ ἐστεφανωμένον, ὅπως χάριτι θεοῦ ὑπὲρ παντὸς γεύσηται θανάτου.
Hebrews 10:25 wrote:μὴ ἐγκαταλείποντες τὴν ἐπισυναγωγὴν ἑαυτῶν, καθὼς ἔθος τισίν, ἀλλὰ παρακαλοῦντες, καὶ τοσούτῳ μᾶλλον, ὅσῳ βλέπετε ἐγγίζουσαν τὴν ἡμέραν.
Hebrews 12:25 wrote:Βλέπετε μὴ παραιτήσησθε τὸν λαλοῦντα.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
Andrew Chapman
Posts: 265
Joined: February 5th, 2013, 5:04 am
Location: Oxford, England
Contact:

Re: 1 John 5:16 possible with aorist?

Post by Andrew Chapman »

That's an impressive and instructive list.
Post Reply

Return to “New Testament”