Re: The article for abstract nouns

From: Al Kidd (akidd@infoave.net)
Date: Sat Jan 03 1998 - 12:52:00 EST


  I believe readers of that thread which has treated us to a
discussion both 1) of a certain use of the Greek article
(John 1:1b) and 2) of its absence (1:1c) will find something
provocative (at least) in the following addition to it. I
offer a few comments on _title phrases_. The
appropriateness of this bit of semantics in the context of
our exegeting John 1:1 will, I trust, become apparent.

  Surely the matter of title phrases gives us something for
the thread that we ought not to overlook. Rien Op Den Brouw,
"The Problem of the Missing Article in the Use of 'God',"
_Religious Studies_ 30 No. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, March 1994) 22 on "title phrases":

          Nelson Pike (1970) has acknowledged the
          plausibility of both the proper name
          analysis and the definite description
          analysis and somehow attempts to combine
          them. He assumes that 'God' is a
          descriptive term rather than a proper
          name. However, in order to take account
          of the intuitive plausibility of the
          proper name analysis of this term, he
          suggests that 'God' is a special kind of
          descriptive expression, which he proposes
          to term as a 'title-phrase'.
          'Grammatically, title-phrases are
          descriptive expressions that often do the
          work of proper names [i.e. function like
          a proper name] and that often appear in
          linguistic environments similar to those
          associated with proper names.'

   One of Brouw's concerns is that he explain why English
does not make use of the article in definite description
references to the God of the Bible, the God of the "Judaeo-
Christian heritage." Of course, both in classical Greek and
in Hellenistic Greek the nonvocative but articulated QEOS
(_theos_) is largely codified for just such a use (namely,
the definite description reference to a particular divinity
whose identity is indicated by context). I believe that we
should agree with Brouw that English suffers the loss and
confusion that might have been avoided had Christendom's
English-using writers used the English definite article for
those instances where 'God' does not function as a title
phrase, but functions only as a definite description
reference to the God of the Bible. Brouw (pp. 21, 26) puts
it this way:

          In the context of Judaeo-Christian
          discourse speakers use 'God'
          referentially or as a predicate to make
          it clear to the reader that they consider
          JHWH as the one and only being deserving
          to be referred to or described as 'God'.
          We have observed that Christian believers
          use the term 'God' without the definite
          article. Given the interpretation of
          'God' as a definite descriptive noun and
          given the observation that in Christian
          discourse 'God' is used without the
          article, we have to say that Christians
          fail grammatically, and accordingly
          semantically, in fixing a definite
          reference. In sum, then, on a definite
          description analysis of 'God' there is
          grammatically a problem because of the
          absence of the article in the use of the
          term 'God' in, for example, . . . 'God
          spoke to Moses'. Rather, this
          grammatical phenomenon would mark the
          term 'God' out, again, as a proper name.
          This interpretation, however, poses for
          us another problem, since the proper name
          analysis of this term yields a meaning
          problem in 'JHWH is God'. We can
          conclude that neither the proper name
          analysis nor the definite description
          analysis can fully account for the
          [English] term 'God'[--note the capital
          "G"--] as it is used by believers in the
          context of the Judaeo-Christian religion.
          As has been argued above, semantically
          'God' is best analysed as a common noun,
          whereas grammatically, the best analysis
          of this term is that of a proper noun....
          On the title-phrase analysis it can be
          accounted for that 'God' is correctly
          used by Christians as a predicate way to
          say something of JHWH, and to refer to
          or address JHWH uniquely in the context
          of the Judaeo-Christian religion. What
          is more, one of the weak points of the
          definite description analysis is that it
          cannot cope with the absence of the
          definite article in, for example, 'God
          spoke to Moses'. The title-phrase
          analysis has remedied this failure. On
          this analysis it can be argued that
          although the term 'God' does not take
          the definite article [in English], it
          concerns here a definite descriptive
          noun phrase. As a title phrase, 'God'
          typically behaves like a proper noun.

(The words in brackets in the quote given immediately above
are interpolations I inserted.)

  I emphasize "typically" in the last line of the quote just
given, because sometimes we have atypical uses--uses that do
not show forth a title-phrase meaning. Also, it does not
seem to me that either apostolic Christianity or ancient
Israelite monotheism owned a denial that there were "gods" in
the sense that such were spirit sons of God, angels. Ancient
Israel did not restrict nonpejorative use of _elohim_ as a
designation for only Jehovah (cf. references to "the gods"
with the meaning of "angels" in even certain (the
nonsectarian) ones of the Dead Sea Scrolls); also, apostolic
Christianity did _not_ restrict nonpejorative use of
QEOS/_elohim_ as a designation for the God of the Bible
(Jehovah) (e.g., Psalm 8:5 _elohim_ with the meaning
'angelic sons of God'; cf. _beneh' elohim_ at Job 38:7; cf.
Psalm 8:5 LXX and the quote of that LXX verse at Heb. 2:7;
also, we may argue that John 1:1c, 18 are verses where their
context (the Prologue) and epistemological/metaphysical
arguments (from a Christian perspective) give us a
nonpejorative use of QEOS for designating one who is other
than Jehovah, the Supreme Being). (I am open to offline
discussion of such issues.)

  Now, for more citations of the Scriptures where semological
problems would result if we were to make use of "Jehovah" as
the semantical equivalent of the definite descriptive noun
HO THEOS in certain passages, see Ro 1:8; 3:29; 15:6;
Php 1:3; Phm 4. In this connection (namely, a comparison of
the Hebrew Bible's uses of an articulated _elohim_ and its
uses of the true God's personal name YHWH (= Jehovah/Yahweh),
we have something from _The Imperial Bible Dictionary_, ed.
P. Fairbairn (London: 1874, p. 856):

          It [(i.e., YHWH)] is everywhere a proper
          name, denoting the personal God and him
          only; whereas Elohim partakes more of the
          character of a common noun, denoting
          usually, indeed, but not necessarily nor
          uniformly, the Supreme. . . . The Hebrew
          may say the Elohim, the true God, in
          opposition to all false gods; but he
          never says the Jehovah, for Jehovah is
          the name of the true God only. He says
          again and again my God . . . ; but never
          my Jehovah, for when he says my God, he
          means Jehovah. He speaks of the God of
          Israel, but never of the Jehovah of
          Israel, for there is no other Jehovah.
          He speaks of the living God, but never
          of the living Jehovah, for he cannot
          conceive of Jehovah as other than
          living.

  So, in view of the material above, is the following
statement not a logical summation--a real rule? namely:

          If a Greek writer wanted to make use of
          the common noun appellative QEOS as a
          definite descriptive reference to the God
          of the Bible, _and_ if he wanted it to
          function as a _title phrase_ having
          semantical equivalence to the divine name
          (YHWH), then he had first of all to
          articulate QEOS, and then to use it in a
          context that truly allows place for it as
          a grammatical (semologically justified)
          equivalent of the divine name
          (Jehovah/Yahweh).

  Now, it seems to me that the apostle John's use of QEOS in
John 1:1b meets the rule, so that the apostle might just as
well have written ". . . and the Logos was with Jehovah" for
1:1b. His next use of QEOS, however, does not meet the rule,
and cannot function as a personal-name reference either to
the Logos or, as trinitarians would have it, to a Logos-
incorporating, (triune) Godhead/Divinity. Consequently,
is there not error in those English translations of John
1:1c that give us "God" for John's predicative use of QEOS?
Does not the logic in such translation (wrongfully) suggest
to us readers of English that John 1:1c gives us a personal,
proper name _equivalent_ for the Logos?

  I submit that QEOS, whether used by Homer, Origen, or by a
monotheistic Jew, 'covers a range of meaning that is not, for
every meaning (in that range), natural to the English word
"God." '

Al Kidd



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