Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

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Matthew Longhorn
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Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

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https://wipfandstock.com/9781666715293/ ... testament/
This book analyzes the existence of the three nuances of the perfect tense occurring in the Greek New Testament: resultative-stative, anterior (current relevance), and simple past. The ancient Greek perfect expresses a resultative-stative nuance, with intransitivity dominant. Some of these archaic perfects survived up to the Koine period and appear in the Greek New Testament. In Classical Greek, the perfect went through a transition from resultative to anterior (current relevance) with increasing transitivity. In the Koine period, the Greek perfect shows another semantic change from the anterior to simple past. In the end, the perfect merged with the aorist, ending up in decay. It disappeared until the modern Greek development of a perfect forming using the auxiliary ἔχω.
“Even advanced Greek scholars sometimes struggle to explain a New Testament author’s choice of the perfect tense. Building on the very good insights of Rutger Allan, Hanbyul Kang demonstrates that three distinct nuances of the perfect tense occur in the New Testament. Kang’s careful analysis goes a long way toward resolving the mystery of the perfect tense’s usage in the New Testament. I have cited Kang’s study in my own writing and will continue to point others to his detailed and insightful work.”
—Robert L. Plummer, Collin and Evelyn Aikman Professor of Biblical Studies, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

“Hanbyul Kang’s work on the Greek perfect is helpful to student and scholar alike. Surveying recent and past views of the perfect in Greek, Kang critiques and analyzes each view. Then he offers his own understanding of the Greek perfect in three general categories: Resultative-Stative (a present state implied from the past), Anterior/Current Relevance (a current relevance resulting from past events), and Perfect as Simple Past (preterite). Kang’s work is clear and compelling.”
—Russell Fuller, President, Theological Classroom
Stephen Carlson
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Stephen Carlson »

This is basically the result you get if you apply one of Bybee’s grammaticalization clines for the perfect to the Greek evidence (as I did myself a while ago). There are some nuances, which I don’t know if this study (that I haven’t read) notices: it does not affect all verbs consistently and uniformly, and the spread of the perfect to anterior and perfective contexts is easier to list than to describe.
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MAubrey
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by MAubrey »

"In Classical Greek, the perfect went through a transition from resultative to anterior (current relevance) with increasing transitivity."
This is a flawed premise to build a book on. Classicists assume this position as a given and then NT people assume that they're right without actually checking. And it's not right.
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Barry Hofstetter
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

MAubrey wrote: October 24th, 2021, 5:25 pm
"In Classical Greek, the perfect went through a transition from resultative to anterior (current relevance) with increasing transitivity."
This is a flawed premise to build a book on. Classicists assume this position as a given and then NT people assume that they're right without actually checking. And it's not right.
Classicists are always right. Just ask us... :) But as amusing as it is, your observation seems quite... well, simplistic and over-broad. While I've never done any systematic study and certainly can't bring the linguistics perspective that you and Stephen can employ, I have noticed that during the classical period the perfect is actually quite rare, and usually makes sense as resultative. There seems to be a time during the Hellenistic and Roman periods where the perfect shows up more frequently, and in my recollection often makes best sense as a simple preterit (I'm thinking primarily of Lucian of Samasota, but a few others as well).

But maybe actually reading the book in the OP would be helpful, rather than speculating on what he might or might not say.
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Matthew Longhorn
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

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Barry Hofstetter wrote: October 25th, 2021, 7:54 am But maybe actually reading the book in the OP would be helpful, rather than speculating on what he might or might not say.
To the surprise of possibly no one, I have a copy coming. Will try to give a summary of the key points they make on this
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Matthew Longhorn wrote: October 25th, 2021, 8:01 am
Barry Hofstetter wrote: October 25th, 2021, 7:54 am But maybe actually reading the book in the OP would be helpful, rather than speculating on what he might or might not say.
To the surprise of possibly no one, I have a copy coming. Will try to give a summary of the key points they make on this
Looking forward to it. Maybe with more detail we can get more specific engagement.
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Matthew Longhorn
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Matthew Longhorn »

Just spotted this that may be worth a watch about this book

https://dailydoseofgreek.com/scripture ... testament/
Matthew Longhorn
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Matthew Longhorn »

In lieu of a summary from me - here is his thesis which is still available via academia.edu
https://www.academia.edu/44644978/Three ... _Testament
Stephen Carlson
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Matthew Longhorn wrote: October 27th, 2021, 8:48 am In lieu of a summary from me - here is his thesis which is still available via academia.edu
https://www.academia.edu/44644978/Three ... _Testament
Thanks for that. It’s completely what I would expect. Mike Aubrey makes an appearance in Kang’s history of research (which, expectedly, is mainly focused on NT grammarians, plus a few beyond that), so I’ll be curious to see how he deals with that.
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Matthew Longhorn
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Re: Kang - Three Nuances of the Perfect Indicative in the Greek NT

Post by Matthew Longhorn »

Stephen Carlson wrote: October 27th, 2021, 4:04 pm It’s completely what I would expect.
Is that related to the thesis as a whole or just the review section? Would be interested to hear your thoughts if you have any on the conclusions Kang makes
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