Re: present indicative in Rom 6:14-24

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Thu Apr 22 1999 - 06:06:10 EDT


<x-rich>At 3:51 PM -0400 4/14/99, Bryan Rocine wrote:

>Dear Carl,

>

>you wrote:

>Bryan wrote:

>> >Here is about where my question comes in. If the passage does
indeed

>> >utilize a "rhetorical" present, I assume Paul anticipates his
readers

>won't

>> >have nearly so much trouble understanding the rhetorical usage as
all

>those

>> >commentators! Your suggestion that this passage may amount to an
example

>of

>> >the "historical present" is helpful. Is that my answer? Or can
the list

>> >point to other Greek literature in which a distinctly rhetorical
use of

>the

>> >present is found, not of the historical present per se, i.e., some
of

>that

>> >"quite a bit of ancient literary and rhetorical models that could

>illuminate

>> >the question."

>>

>> One other Pauline example of rhetorical usage of the present tense
in the

>> first person comes immediately to mind: 1 Cor 13: EAN TAIS GLWSSAIS
TWN

>> ANQRWPWN LALW KAI TWN AGGELWN ...

>

>But isn't 1 Cor 13:1-2 present *subjunctive* as made implied by v. 2's
EIDW,

>so that the whole construction is a protasis-apodosis construction?

I've kept this message in my active mailbox and have finally gotten
back to it; I'll agree with you about 1 Cor 13:1-2 about those present
tenses, although I think that this chapter as a whole DOES fall into
the category of rhetorical first person; although Paul shifts into the
third person in 13:4 to make AGAPH his subject, yet in 13:9-12 he
returns to the first person, using it first in the plural in 13:9 (EK
MEROUS GAR GINWSKOMEN KAI EK MEROUS PROFHTEUOMEN) but then into the
first singular in 13:11 (hOTE HMHN NHPIOS KTL). So I really do think we
have a rhetorical use of the first person here.

A comparable passage is Philippians 3:3ff, where Paul is indeed talking
about his own experience, to be sure, but appears to be using it in a
sense that he expects to be paradigmatic for those who hear his letter
been read aloud--so that I think this is really comparable to Romans 7
where the first-person experience transcends any MERELY
autobiographical significance.

What do you think?

Carl W. Conrad

Department of Classics/Washington University

One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018

Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649

cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu

WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/

</x-rich>



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