Re: Rev 18:20

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Tue Jun 22 1999 - 05:43:16 EDT


At 11:23 PM -0400 6/21/99, Moon-Ryul Jung wrote:
>On 06/19/99, ""Carl W. Conrad" <cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu>" wrote:
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>> At 1:56 PM -0400 6/19/99, Bill Barton wrote:
>> >Carl Conrad wrote:
>> >
>> >CC>No, EK in this instance [Rev 18:20] must mean (oddly) "with reference
>> >to", an extraordinary extension of "arising from", i.e., it really does
>> >start out as an ablatival genitive, but passes over into a semantic realm
>> >close to what one expects with an accusative of respect or dative of
>> >respect.>
>> >
>> >
>> >Some other examples of the idiom "avenge from":
>> >
>> >
>> >Rev 6:10 God is entreated to judge the martyrs "from (ek) the inhabitants
>> >of the earth."
>> >
>> >Rev 19:2 God avenged the blood of his servants "from (ek) her hand."
>> >
>> >Luke 18:3 The widow entreated the judge to avenge her "from (apo) my
>> >adversary."
>> >
>> >Deut 18:19 in LXX God said of those who ignored the Prophet "I will avenge
>> >myself from (ek) him."
>> >
>> >1 Sam 24:13 in LXX David said to Saul "may the Lord avenge me from (ek)
>> >you."
>> >
>> >
>> >Could it be that the sense of the idiom is that the judgment removes
>> >something from the one judged, so that the use of EK with the genitive is
>> >in the sense of separation?
>> (
>> I suppose it could be a Semitism; on the other hand, what leaped
>> immediately to my mind when I saw this was a Latin idiom, SUPPLICIUM SUMERE
>> DE ALIQUO, "to exact punishment from someone": Here is the section from the
>> Lewis & Short Latin dictionary at the Perseus site, s.v. SUMO.
>>
>
>Carl,
>
>The hypothesis that MIN + adversary in revenge formula became
>( EX (Greek) + adversary seems to make sense for me. Thanks
>for this observation. Now my question is: Is there such a thing
>"genitive of respect"? Or is it posed to make examples like Rev 18:20
>make sense?

No, I never meant to suggest that there's a "Genitive of Respect," and in
fact I'm one of those who objects strenuously to invention of new
grammatical categories; all that I was arguing is that in this particular
instance (and it IS in Revelation, where we do find a high incidence of
deviation from standard grammatical structures), genitive with EX seems to
function like a Dative of Respect or an Accusative of Respect. On the other
hand, there's a very common usage of the Genitive with PERI to mean "With
regard to ..." or "Concerning ..."
--but that seems normally associated adverbially with a predicate as a
whole rather than to qualify a particular word.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/

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