[b-greek] Re: AUTOU in John 9:6

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Wed Nov 22 2000 - 17:43:41 EST


At 2:18 PM -0600 11/22/00, Steven Craig Miller wrote:
>To: Don Larsen,
>
><< My query concerns word order in John 9 - the position of genitive
>personal pronouns. The first example is in Jn. 9:6: KAI EPECRISEN AUTOU TON
>PHLON EPI TOUS OFQALMOUS... The genitive personal pronoun precedes rather
>than follows the word it modifies by possession. This pattern then recurs
>in the chapter in verses 10, 11, 14, 15, 17, 21, 26, and 30. The
>construction modified by possession is always either EPI TOUS OFQALMOUS or
>TOUS OFQALMOUS. >>
>
>A. T. Robertson writes:
>
><< It will not do to say that emphasis alone explains every unusual order
>of words in a Greek sentence. Take Jo. 9:6, for instance, EPEQHKEN AUTOU
>TON PHLON EPI TOUS OFQALMOUS. Here AUTOU is entirely removed from OFQALMOUS
>and is without particular emphasis >> (419-420).
>
>Of course, Robertson is working with a different variant reading.
>
>I wonder if AUTOU might not be better understood as the object of the verb?
>Literally, "he anointed (or "placed upon") him with clay upon the eyes." (I
>don't mean to suggest that this is a good English translation, only this is
>how one might "understand" the Greek.) Or am I mistaken here?

I would agree with this; that sort of separation from TOUS OFQALMOUS is
just too much for a possessive pronoun, but the genitive could be
understood well as a genitive of place with the compound verb EPICRIW.

--

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/

---
B-Greek home page: http://metalab.unc.edu/bgreek
You are currently subscribed to b-greek as: [jwrobie@mindspring.com]
To unsubscribe, forward this message to leave-b-greek-327Q@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 - 15:36:42 EDT