ego eimi in job 33:31

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James Bell
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ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by James Bell »

In job 33:31 brentons edition, I will speak...evotizo Iob kai akoue mou; kopheusov kai eyo eimi lalaso...why is the present tense ego eimi hooked to the future tense?
Jonathan Robie
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by Jonathan Robie »

Is this the text? I had a hard time reading your transcription:
ἐνωτίζου, ᾿Ιώβ, καὶ ἄκουέ μου· κώφευσον, καὶ ἐγώ εἰμι λαλήσω.
Let's take this a bit at a time.

ἐνωτίζου, ᾿Ιώβ - give ear, Job
καὶ ἄκουέ μου - and listen to me
κώφευσον - shut up
καὶ ἐγώ εἰμι λαλήσω - and I am the one who will speak

Does that make sense?

Incidentally, check out all the other places that λαλήσω occurs in Job:

Jb 7:11, Jb 9:35, Jb 10:1, Jb 13:3, Jb 13:13, Jb 13:15, Jb 16:4, Jb 16:6, Jb 19:7, Jb 21:3, Jb 32:18, Jb 32:20, Jb 33:31, Jb 42:4

To me, it looks like the use of this expression may be significant for interpreting the book.
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Stephen Hughes
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by Stephen Hughes »

James Bell wrote:why is the present tense ego eimi hooked to the future tense
You are right in identifying a difference between the tenses here. The form λαλήσω could be either future or subjunctive, but there are 2 reasons for taking it as future; first, it is not in a complex sentence (subordinate clause) and second, there are a lot of other futures all around it in other verses.

As for the tenses. In the time frame of the narrative the ἐγώ εἰμι is the present situation - Elihu is there with Job, and λαλήσω is future because he hasn't made his point yet - he is still positioning himself in the dialogue.

I do not think that those two elements are "hooked to{gether}", perhaps it would be better to punctuate the Greek with a comma. Brenton's English translation runs the two things together.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
James Bell
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Joined: January 26th, 2012, 12:54 pm

Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by James Bell »

Thank you for clarifying to me that ego eimi is not part of Lego...I'm sorry my kindle won't do the greek characters...thank you, I am satisfied with your answers and now will go back to reading and learning more.
RandallButh
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by RandallButh »

There is something funny about εἰμί. The Greek text would need a break between it and λαλήσω.

I suspect that the LXX translator had a different or defective text in front of him. Since he used an Aramaic translation (Job 42.17ff) as a guideline, it is possible that he was trying to harmonize two different traditions at this point. In any case, I would not use this stichos of poetry as normative Greek.
Stephen Hughes
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by Stephen Hughes »

James Bell wrote:Thank you for clarifying to me that ego eimi is not part of Lego
RandallButh wrote:There is something funny about εἰμί. The Greek text would need a break between it and λαλήσω.
There are a number of different words in Greek for speaking, one of them is λέγειν and another is λαλεῖν. You can read one scholar Trench's view of the difference between λέγειν and λαλεῖν in this pdf on page 287.
James Bell wrote:I am satisfied with your answers and now will go back to reading and learning more.
Getting more and more exposure to a language is a solid but slow way to learn. Many people who do that take a course after they have been exposed to a speech community for a few years, just to straighten out misunderstandings and to fill in gaps of things that they hadn't accidently come across. I have heard it said that there are 6 month kick you in at the deep-end approaches to learning Chinese, which are followed up by some classroom instruction. I expect that those who learn in that way would have a better feel for the language, but perhaps not be so cool with grammar after 1 year than someone who had spent a year in the classroom.
Γελᾷ δ' ὁ μωρός, κἄν τι μὴ γέλοιον ᾖ
(Menander, Γνῶμαι μονόστιχοι 108)
cwconrad
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by cwconrad »

Jonathan Robie wrote:
ἐνωτίζου, ᾿Ιώβ, καὶ ἄκουέ μου· κώφευσον, καὶ ἐγώ εἰμι λαλήσω.
Let's take this a bit at a time.

ἐνωτίζου, ᾿Ιώβ - give ear, Job
καὶ ἄκουέ μου - and listen to me
κώφευσον - shut up
καὶ ἐγώ εἰμι λαλήσω - and I am the one who will speak

Does that make sense?
I'm baffled by Jonathan's response. I don't see how "I am the one who will speak" derives from the Greek text, ἐγώ εἰμι λαλήσω. I can see two clauses -- ἐγώ εἰμι, "I am the one" (older English: "It is I") and λαλήσω, "I will speak" But there's no punctuation suggesting two separate clauses and there's certainly no relative pronoun linking λαλήσω to εγώ εἰμι. MT has וְאָנֹכִ֥י אֲדַבֵּֽר -- where I can see no equivalent of εἰμί. Perhaps I'm not understanding either the Hebrew or the Greek text. I can see the Greek as "It's ME! I'll do the talking!" -- but again, that's two distinct clauses. What am I missing?
οὔτοι ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς πάντα θεοὶ θνητοῖς ὑπέδειξαν,
ἀλλὰ χρόνῳ ζητέοντες ἐφευρίσκουσιν ἄμεινον. (Xenophanes, Fragment 16)

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
Jonathan Robie
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Re: ego eimi in job 33:31

Post by Jonathan Robie »

Thanks for the correction, Carl.

I read this as "It's ME! I'll do the talking!", and translated that in my mind to "I'm the one who will speak", as in, "you shut up, I'll talk". I did not look at the Hebrew, since I can't read it.
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
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