[B-Greek] Romans 8:16: SUMMARTUREI TWi PNEUMATI

Brian Abasciano bvabasciano at gmail.com
Tue Jun 10 15:03:57 EDT 2008


Perhaps I should mention that I had not really read Wallace, but was going 
by what was said on the list about his position. Don't you agree that 
SUMMARTUREW with the dative could mean either "witness with" or "witness to" 
as seems to be commonly affirmed by commentators on Rom 8:16? And then would 
you not agree that it is really a matter of determining the most appropriate 
sense from context?

By the way, Wallace is very clear in his grammar that he thinks Rom 8:16 
does not have the associative idea in it, but that it speaks of the witness 
of the Holy Spirit to the human spirit, following Cranfield (wisely IMO).


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Elizabeth Kline" <kline_dekooning at earthlink.net>
To: "greek B-Greek" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Cc: "Brian Abasciano" <bvabasciano at gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2008 2:49 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Romans 8:16: SUMMARTUREI TWi PNEUMATI



On Jun 10, 2008, at 10:50 AM, Brian Abasciano wrote:

> I agree with Wallace generally on this question. Is anyone claiming  that 
> SUMMARTUREW can only mean "witness with"? I think the important  point is 
> that it could mean either "witness with" (associative) or  "witenss to" 
> (intensive or indirect object).

A quote from the article

start quote///
One of the fundamental problems with this verb is that in certain
contexts the meaning of “bear witness with” someone can mean almost
the same thing as “bear witness to” someone. This is one of the
reasons why there is confusion in Rom 8:16. For example, even in the
indirect object view, there are various permutations:

1. “bear witness to” a jury or a judge

2. “bear witness to” the truth, act, opinion, etc.

3. “bear witness to” the defendant, either for/on behalf of (dativus
commodi) or against (dativus incommodi) him; this also shades off into
“assure.”

The first of these would be a pure indirect object usage: the jury or
judge is neutral and is hearing the case. The second kind of bearing
witness is a confirmation of the truth, etc. This would certainly not
involve an associative idea unless that which bears the truth-witness
is also cut from the same cloth, or if truth is personified. The third
permutation, that of bearing witness to, for, or against a defendant
is the kind of indirect usage I see in Rom 8:16. It is thus also a
dative of interest.19 But this is the closest of the three
permutations to an associative idea. So, how can we distinguish the
two in other texts?

/// end quote


We should pay particularly close attention to this statement:
"The third permutation, that of bearing witness to, for, or against a
defendant is the kind of indirect usage I see in Rom 8:16. It is thus
also a dative of interest.19 But this is the closest of the three
permutations to an associative idea."

There is some confusion in the treatment of this issue caused by
setting "direct object" against "associative dative" mixing
syntactical and semantic categories. If we just forget about "direct
object" and focus on the semantic question then perhaps we would see
that Wallace doesn't really think that "witness to" is the best way to
understand  SUMMARTUREI ... in  Romans 8:16.


Elizabeth Kline







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