Re: Aktionsart vs. Aspect

From: Paul Zellmer (pzellmer@ix7.ix.netcom.com)
Date: Thu May 15 1997 - 08:55:00 EDT


roland milanese wrote:
>
> So it seems that in English there is a tendency for lexical "inceptive"
> aspect to neutralize grammatical "incompletive" aspect; this tendency
> appears to derive from the logic that a beginning necessarily implies
> that the thing begun is viewed as incomplete, and it is incomplete
> whether we put -ing on an aspectual verb or not. But the presence or
> absence of the -ing form does make a difference, and for this reason I
> would object to using the -ing form in the translation of, say, Mt
> 4:11:
> "and angels came and were beginning to minister ..."
>

Roland,

Let me make sure I understand this last statement of yours. You are
saying that this is *not* how you would translate Matt 4:11, correct?
If this is the case, would you accept "and angels came and were
ministering to him"? In this case, the aorist and the imperfect would
be differentiated, and the inceptive sense of the phrase comes from the
aorist. I believe this is what Michael and the others were arguing for.

Paul



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