From: Jonathan Robie (jonathan@texcel.no)
Date: Tue Feb 17 1998 - 14:38:21 EST
At 12:43 PM 2/17/98 -0600, Carl William Conrad wrote:
>For what it's worth, I think it ought to be said that polygamy is NOT a
>standard practice in Greek or Roman society, although there's plenty of
>evidence of mistresses and adultery; but there is no officially sanctioned
>polygamy.
Thanks! Does anybody know whether polygamy was sanctioned among the Jews of
the time?
>I recall there was a discussion of this phrase two or more years ago, and
>at that time somebody (it may have been myself, I don't remember)
>mentioned that in Latin the word UNIVIRA is a word of high praise for a
>Roman woman: it means precisely GUNH hENOS ANDROS--a woman who even though
>entitled to remarry after a husband's death has deliberately not done so.
I tried to find something in the archives that would give definitive
information on this, but found only a few allusions.
I found two articles in the archives that use the word Univira, one from
1992, and one from 1995.
http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek/archives/greek-1/msg00201.html
http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek/archives/greek-3/msg01237.html
Neither really says whether this was considered a virtue in the early
Christian community.
David Moore had an interesting comment in another post:
http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek/archives/greek-3/msg01416.html
>The singular construction we find in these verses may hold the
>key to the interpretation. That this construction (number - genitive -
>noun where the number and genitive together modify the other noun) did
>not show up in a search of the NT except in these passages in the
>Pastorals may indicate it is a singular construction with a singular
>meaning. I was looking through a book of personal-correspondence papyri
>last night to see if I could locate a similar construction, but no luck
>on that score.
I'm gonna have to look at some commentaries and see what else I can find;
in the meantime, I'd be grateful for any info people have...
Jonathan
jonathan@texcel.no
Texcel Research
http://www.texcel.no
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