Re: Re: Re: Is TEMPUS A Part of Greek Grammar?

From: Cwinbery@aol.com
Date: Mon Sep 27 1999 - 19:50:47 EDT


Jonathan wrote;

>>In Rev. 5:10 there is a textual problem in that Ms Alexandrinus and some
>>others have the present (omit the S). Alexandrinus is considered to be a
very
>>good ms in Rev. (better than Sinaiticus by some scholars). Even Westcott and
>>Hort agreed with Alex. here.

>The UBS 3rd has the future (with the S), and only a "C" confidence rating.
>In Metzger's Textual Commentary, he upgrades this to a "A" confidence
>rating, arguing that Alexandrinus "mistakenly" reads BASILEUOUSIN in Rev
>20:6 - I assume this means that it is alone or almost alone in reading
>BASILEUOUSIN rather than BASILEUSOUSIN in that case, and this gives an
>example where the future is mistakenly changed to a present with future >
>meaning, so if it happened once, maybe this is likely to happen again.
>
>At any rate, I don't see any real difference between BASILEUSOUSIN
>and BASILEUOUSIN with future meaning. Both means of expressing the future
>seem fairly common in Koine (as is MELLW + infinitive), and I could easily
>imagine people changing in either direction. Since the change does not
>affect meaning, it doesn't seem particularly important for interpreting the
>verse.

When I first responded, all I had at home was the old Nestle 21st ed. I now
have the N-A27th in hand. The evidence for the present tense is Alexandrinus,
4 minuscules that show some differences from the Byzantine, the portion of
the Byzantine indicated by Mk (that which doesnot come from the tradition of
the commentaries of Andreas). The evidence for the future is Aleph, 5
minuscules that have some differences from the Byzantine and the Byzantine
tradition of Ma (Andreas). With the translations favoring the present, it
probably has the weight of the external witnesses. However, I think that
scribes would more probably change the present to a future than vice versa. I
would disagree with Metzger here and opt for the present tense. No, it
doesn't make any difference given the penchant to use the futuristic present
in the Revelation.

Carlton Winbery
Prof. Religion
LA College

---
B-Greek home page: http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek
You are currently subscribed to b-greek as: [cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu]
To unsubscribe, forward this message to leave-b-greek-329W@franklin.oit.unc.edu
To subscribe, send a message to subscribe-b-greek@franklin.oit.unc.edu


This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Sat Apr 20 2002 - 15:40:40 EDT