B-Greek: The Biblical Greek Forum

Stephen Hughes wrote:

cwconrad wrote:Perhaps you meant "make or break" -- if so, that might well be true.
On the other hand, if you really did mean "break or break" -- that might be true too.

I was trying to be polite and find something positive to say about the treatment of participles, but I was standing over the computer on my way to class when I typed it and my true thinking about how they are currently treated came out.

Stephen Hughes wrote:The natural emergence (at around 2;0) of the "Give me the mummy made it cake" type constructions sort of ends up the same in the romance languages (and Modern Greek) as it does in English.

Stephen Carlson wrote:Yeah, it's not going to help with participles, but I don't know what commonly learned modern language would.

Relatives are so ingrained in my thinking that it is hard for me to imagine that participles are not "sort of" like them. Relatives sort of serve the function of participles in English. The case in Chinese is very different - there are no relatives - only something like a participle. Take for example the sentence, {10 Chinese characters follow} 给我一个妈妈做的蛋糕 Gěi (give) wǒ (I) yī (one) gè (unit marker word) māmā (mummy) zuò (make) de (particle of marking that it is something like participial / relative unit) dàngāo (cake) ("Give me one of the cakes which mummy made"). A variation could be {10 Chinese characters follow} 给我那个妈妈做的蛋糕 Gěi (give) wǒ (I) nà (that) gè (unit marker word) māmā (mummy) zuò (make) de (particle of marking that it is something like participial / relative unit) dàngāo (cake). The (extra from the point of view of adult English) "it" in "Give me the mummy made it cake" is of course retained in Semitic languages (and Coptic).

In Greek it's mind blowing! There are both participial and relative systems working together and they are clearly differentiated. The linguistic stub that emerges in child grammar at two years of age (2;0) is allowed to produce both options without either option being stunted. It is suggested in the literature that a full understanding of relatives comes at about nine years of age (9;0). So, I presume that by nine years of age, a child growing up with Koine Greek as a first language would have mastered the integrated system. That suggests that it predates the logical and rhetorical communication systems that would come in the teenage years.

A syntax of Greek needs to map out and trace the development and the range of functions of both branches and how they are intertwined.

I wanted to shorten the cited material but can't see anything that should be cut from it. I think this is a nice airing of some of the difficulties that I think even native speakers and writers of ancient Greek had with "proper" usage of participles and relative clauses. I've seen it suggested by some whose opinions I respect that ancient Greek participles ought to be classified and understood as relative clauses. I'm not confident that an adequate accounting of the varied usages in which we find both of them in Greek texts can be offered in terms of a unified theory, although I can readily imagine that such a theory may be offered, if it hasn't been offered already. But experienced readers of Greek can, I believe, discern when a Greek author has failed to observe any distinction between the two in usage; without doubt there'll be some disagreement about that, but it's what I think.

Stephen surmises above that "by nine years of age, a child growing up with Koine Greek as a first language would have mastered the integrated system". I rather suspect that some would have mastered it far more successfully than others. Which brings me back to my recurrent (ad nauseam) rant against the author of Eph 1:3-14:

Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ πνευματικῇ ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ, 4 καθὼς ἐξελέξατο ἡμᾶς ἐν αὐτῷ πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ ἐν ἀγάπῃ, 5 προορίσας ἡμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς αὐτόν, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, 6 εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ ἧς ἐχαρίτωσεν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἠγαπημένῳ. 7 Ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν διὰ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτοῦ, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωμάτων, κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ 8 ἧς ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς ἡμᾶς, ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ φρονήσει, 9 γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν αὐτοῦ ἣν προέθετο ἐν αὐτῷ 10 εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ. 11 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ἐκληρώθημεν προορισθέντες κατὰ πρόθεσιν τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐνεργοῦντος κατὰ τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ 12 εἰς τὸ εἶναι ἡμᾶς εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ τοὺς προηλπικότας ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ. 13 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἀκούσαντες τὸν λόγον τῆς ἀληθείας, τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς σωτηρίας ὑμῶν, ἐν ᾧ καὶ πιστεύσαντες ἐσφραγίσθητε τῷ πνεύματι τῆς ἐπαγγελίας τῷ ἁγίῳ, 14 ὅ ἐστιν ἀρραβὼν τῆς κληρονομίας ἡμῶν, εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως, εἰς ἔπαινον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ.

I make no secret of my long-held conviction that Paul didn't compose it, although this is not the proper place for airing reasons for that conviction, apart from the very awkwardness of the flow of clauses in this sequence. Some people may be able to lay out a diagram of the interrelationships of this string of participial phrases and relative clauses that shows every element of it in its proper place to their own satisfaction; my repeated efforts to do that have failed to satisfy me. The individual segments of this bit of λέξις εἰρομένη are intelligible enough, but I don't think that they cohere adequately. I think that this author either has not "mastered the integrated system" or -- perhaps more likely -- hasn't made the effort of better authors to think through and/or revise what he's writen. Plato, on the other hand, is said to have spent considerable time revising the opening sentence of the Republic

Κατέβην χθὲς εἰς Πειραιᾶ μετὰ Γλαύκωνος τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος προσευξόμενός τε τῇ θεῷ καὶ ἅμα τὴν ἑορτὴν βουλόμενος θεάσασθαι τίνα τρόπον ποιήσουσιν ἅτε νῦν πρῶτον ἄγοντες.

In my view the participles in the Platonic passage are "beasts of burden", those in the passage from Ephesians Trojan horses.

cwconrad wrote:I make no secret of my long-held conviction that Paul didn't compose it

It is an eclectic passage to say the least. I have two questions for you and one thought you might like to give feed back on.

Question 1: Tell me if you know, do the mathematicians construct their descriptions of geometry in the same way. What is written there looks like "sermon notes" rather than a fully written out composition.

Thought: I sometimes do similar things when I am composing in another language. While not agreeing or disagreeing with you with regard to the true authourship, I want to assume for a moment for argument's sake that it was the apostle's own composition and look at the differences between my compositional style and what I assume that he did.

We can see from his other writings that he has an excellent command of the language and that from time to time his mind worked faster than his hand could keep up with. I suppose / assume that when he wrote the notes that you have presented, that he would have thought more or less fully about what he wanted to say, and then written them down in summary. For a semi-literate like myself, I would write down such notes then later go over them and expand them out.

Another thing is that, if I were doing it, I would start by jotting down the verbs then expand them out with other things, like the prepositional phrases. This is being done in the other direction from the pattern that I have gotten into (from the usual North and Hillard etc). Of course when it came to verse composition, it had to get about more flexible, but it was still basically the same old same old.

Prepositional phrases are the most outside of the contexts that ultimately define the meanings of a sentence. If the contexts that we have written here are the first thoughts, then perhaps the system of teaching composition working from the verb out at beginners' level, could the order be reversed for compositions at an intermediate or advanced level.

Question 2: When you compose where do you start? or where do you teach your students to start?

cwconrad wrote:I'm not confident that an adequate accounting of the varied usages in which we find both of them in Greek texts can be offered in terms of a unified theory, although I can readily imagine that such a theory may be offered, if it hasn't been offered already. (Emphasis added by me SH)

My ideas a still being formulated, but on the surface there seems to be a difference between the way that in different genres, different usage patterns may be more appropriate. That sort of differentiation would sort of preclude a unified theory.

Bearing in mind that the definitive thoughts of the imbecilic have always served as a dangerous basis for any form of human progress, let me share my vague thoughts on this so that others more capable than myself can share wisdom in criticising them. In a general way, my feeling for it is that the verbal actions described by participle and relatives seem to differ in that participles seem to be more descriptive (slowing things down and describing the context), while relatives seem to be more consecutive (moving our thoughts on to other periphery in turn).

Stephen Hughes wrote:

cwconrad wrote:I make no secret of my long-held conviction that Paul didn't compose it

It is an eclectic passage to say the least. I have two questions for you and one thought you might like to give feed back on.

Question 1: Tell me if you know, do the mathematicians construct their descriptions of geometry in the same way. What is written there looks like "sermon notes" rather than a fully written out composition.

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at here. This text seems about as far removed from any Euclidean formulation as it could possibly be:the movement from one Eucidean statement to the next fits into a precise and necessary sequence, while the "Pauline" sequence seems arbitrary, wanting in any clearly-discernible movement from one notion to the next.

The treatises of Aristotle are thought to be lecture notes; the difficulty in reading them has always seemed to me to be ambiguities of referents of pronoun, relative pronoouns especially. Epictetus' discourses are supposedly Arrian's transcripts of public discourses; they too seem more coherent than this passage in Ephesians. The sequence in Ephesians reminds me of oral prayers of semi-literate lay persons who link together short clauses of simple theological propositions -- items of belief that are not connected in any necessary sequential order. It's a string of formulaic clauses, but it doesn't seem like an outline for any sort of carefuly formulation such as we see in Romans or 1 Corinthians.

Stephen Hughes wrote:Thought: I sometimes do similar things when I am composing in another language. While not agreeing or disagreeing with you with regard to the true authorship, I want to assume for a moment for argument's sake that it was the apostle's own composition and look at the differences between my compositional style and what I assume that he did.

We can see from his other writings that he has an excellent command of the language and that from time to time his mind worked faster than his hand could keep up with. I suppose / assume that when he wrote the notes that you have presented, that he would have thought more or less fully about what he wanted to say, and then written them down in summary. For a semi-literate like myself, I would write down such notes then later go over them and expand them out.

Yes, there are passages where he's omitted items that must have been clear to those listening to his letters read aloud -- as in Gal 1, and there are passages where there's an anacoluthon and he starts over in mid-sentence, but these are much more intelligible, it seems to me, than this sequence in Ephesians 1.

Stephen Hughes wrote:Another thing is that, if I were doing it, I would start by jotting down the verbs then expand them out with other things, like the prepositional phrases. This is being done in the other direction from the pattern that I have gotten into (from the usual North and Hillard etc). Of course when it came to verse composition, it had to get about more flexible, but it was still basically the same old same old.

Prepositional phrases are the most outside of the contexts that ultimately define the meanings of a sentence. If the contexts that we have written here are the first thoughts, then perhaps the system of teaching composition working from the verb out at beginners' level, could the order be reversed for compositions at an intermediate or advanced level.

Question 2: When you compose where do you start? or where do you teach your students to start?

Frankly, I haven't thought of this in terms of how I have composed or taught composition. I've been retired for more than a decade now and never did teach Greek composition beyond the very basics (I've taught Latin composition and had much more experience with that).

Eph 1:3-14:

Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ πνευματικῇ ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ, 4 καθὼς ἐξελέξατο ἡμᾶς ἐν αὐτῷ πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ ἐν ἀγάπῃ, 5 προορίσας ἡμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς αὐτόν, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, 6 εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ ἧς ἐχαρίτωσεν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἠγαπημένῳ. 7 Ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν διὰ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτοῦ, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωμάτων, κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ 8 ἧς ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς ἡμᾶς, ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ φρονήσει, 9 γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν αὐτοῦ ἣν προέθετο ἐν αὐτῷ 10 εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ. 11 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ἐκληρώθημεν προορισθέντες κατὰ πρόθεσιν τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐνεργοῦντος κατὰ τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ 12 εἰς τὸ εἶναι ἡμᾶς εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ τοὺς προηλπικότας ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ. 13 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἀκούσαντες τὸν λόγον τῆς ἀληθείας, τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς σωτηρίας ὑμῶν, ἐν ᾧ καὶ πιστεύσαντες ἐσφραγίσθητε τῷ πνεύματι τῆς ἐπαγγελίας τῷ ἁγίῳ, 14 ὅ ἐστιν ἀρραβὼν τῆς κληρονομίας ἡμῶν, εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως, εἰς ἔπαινον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ.

So Paul (or whoever) was on a roll, and maybe dictating to an amanuensis who could hardly keep up.
It's one of those passages where I tell my students "Watch out for those 'Ho's."

cwconrad wrote:I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at here.

You have understood the crux of my question - Is there any apparent order or logic in the presentation in the verses? (No.)

cwconrad wrote:Frankly, I haven't thought of this in terms of how I have composed or taught composition. I've been retired for more than a decade now and never did teach Greek composition beyond the very basics

The point of this question is to ascertain whether you thought an experienced writer of Greek would start with what Con Campbell calls the context and work to the verb, or start at the verb then work to the context as I have been used to doing?

Both of them was to test the passing thought, held without conviction, wondering whether they could have been sermon notes (independent of the question of who wrote or dictated them).

Stephen Hughes wrote:

cwconrad wrote:I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at here.

You have understood the crux of my question - Is there any apparent order or logic in the presentation in the verses? (No.)

cwconrad wrote:Frankly, I haven't thought of this in terms of how I have composed or taught composition. I've been retired for more than a decade now and never did teach Greek composition beyond the very basics

The point of this question is to ascertain whether you thought an experienced writer of Greek would start with what Con Campbell calls the context and work to the verb, or start at the verb then work to the context as I have been used to doing?

Both of them was to test the passing thought, held without conviction, wondering whether they could have been sermon notes (independent of the question of who wrote or dictated them).

Okay, let's pursue the relationship between how we compose Greek and the formulation we find in the sequence in Eph 1. While I've used North and Hillard (Hilliard?) both as a student and as a teacher -- but only for very early exercises in basic structural units. When I compose I always think in terms of the idea I want to express and it will always involve some kind of linkage of structure and predicate, then think of how that's best expressed in a Greek style appropriate to the genre (more often then not, I tend to imitate Platonic style). If it's an outline, I'd likely use verbal nouns with subjective and/or objective genitives expressing subject and essential complements. But our passage in Ephesians is loaded with participial verbs, relative pronouns and adverbial conjunctions that would seem to indicate subordination of some clauses to others, while it's hard to get a clear sense of which element(s) is/are subordinate to which other(s). That's why I don't see something like a sermon outline here and am inclined to think more in terms of a very loose string of dependent clauses that might be used in a prayer, perhaps of thanksgiving -- or perhaps not.

In another vein, let me follow your idea of it being a prayer for a moment

Eph 1:3-14:

Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ πνευματικῇ ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ, 4 καθὼς ἐξελέξατο ἡμᾶς ἐν αὐτῷ πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ ἐν ἀγάπῃ, 5 προορίσας ἡμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς αὐτόν, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, 6 εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ ἧς ἐχαρίτωσεν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἠγαπημένῳ. 7 Ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν διὰ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτοῦ, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωμάτων, κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ 8 ἧς ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς ἡμᾶς, ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ φρονήσει, 9 γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν αὐτοῦ ἣν προέθετο ἐν αὐτῷ 10 εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ. 11 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ἐκληρώθημεν προορισθέντες κατὰ πρόθεσιν τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐνεργοῦντος κατὰ τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ 12 εἰς τὸ εἶναι ἡμᾶς εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ τοὺς προηλπικότας ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ. 13 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἀκούσαντες τὸν λόγον τῆς ἀληθείας, τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς σωτηρίας ὑμῶν, ἐν ᾧ καὶ πιστεύσαντες ἐσφραγίσθητε τῷ πνεύματι τῆς ἐπαγγελίας τῷ ἁγίῳ, 14 ὅ ἐστιν ἀρραβὼν τῆς κληρονομίας ἡμῶν, εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως, εἰς ἔπαινον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ.

I've added some semi-relevant emboldening and underlining to talk about the extended uses of the participle and the various relatives. My underlining with emboldening of the third person possessive pronouns are the one that seem to refer back to the Father, but I realise that my choice of designation may not be the choice that others would choose.

Stephen Hughes wrote:participles seem to be more descriptive (slowing things down and describing the context), while relatives seem to be more consecutive (moving our thoughts on to other periphery in turn)

(I haven't proved the truth of my statement to my own satisfaction yet, but I'll work with it for now)

If we take that participles are places where we stop and dwell on the thing that has been mentioned and are able to find out more details, then those εὐλογήσας, προορίσας and γνωρίσας, are the things that we stop and think about to learn more about θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. As I would expect in "good" Greek, the relatives are about the (linguistically in this passage) peripheral details about the Christ. (I read and understand from that the passage is referring to work of Christ ofter the incarnation event and I don't think that the passage is semi-Arian).

Shirley Rollinson wrote:So Paul (or whoever) was on a roll, and maybe dictating to an amanuensis who could hardly keep up.

In view of the trinitarian structure, I think it could perhaps be more thought out than a roll.

It is clearly an early trinitarian formulation. It does begin with the Father and end with the Holy Spirit, but it is not just a 1-2-3 formulation like the post-Basilian Δόξα Πατρὶ καὶ Υἱῷ καὶι Αγίῳ Πνεύματι "Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit". I think that what is relevant to the discussion of whether it is a prayer or not, is that end of a number of thoughts is marked by the use of the αὐτοῦ (both in reference to the Son and to the Holy Spirit).

In reference to whether it is a prayer or not we could take some examples:

In Psalm 50:3 (LXX), which is clearly a prayer, ἐλέησόν με ὁ θεός κατὰ τὸ μέγα ἔλεός σου καὶ κατὰ τὸ πλῆθος τῶν οἰκτιρμῶν σου ἐξάλειψον τὸ ἀνόμημά μου. ("Deal mercifully with me, O God, bearing in mind the greatness of your mercy, and weighing up my deeds up against just how many compassions you have that you could show, erase the record of all that I have done against Your Law."), and the pronouns are in the second person (σου)

For another example, we could look at an Eastern Orthodox prayer from which we can see that while the participles are nominative (for vocative - which there is no form), the pronouns are second person.

This is a prayer from the Liturgy of (Saint) John Chrysostom which I have quoted:
http://www.goarch.org/chapel/liturgical ... gy_hchc-el

Ὁ Θεὸς ὁ ἅγιος, ὁ ἐν ἁγίοις ἀναπαυόμενος, ὁ τρισαγίῳ φωνῇ ὑπὸ τῶν Σεραφεὶμ ἀνυμνούμενος καὶ ὑπὸ τῶν Χερουβεὶμ δοξολογούμενος καὶ ὑπὸ πάσης ἐπουρανίου δυνάμεως ροσκυνούμενος, ὁ ἐκ τοῦ μὴ ὄντος εἰς τὸ εἶναι παραγαγὼν τὰ σύμπαντα· ὁ κτίσας τὸν ἄνθρωπον κατ' εἰκόνα σὴν καὶ ὁμοίωσιν καὶ παντί σου χαρίσματι κατακοσμήσας· ὁ διδοὺς αἰτοῦντι σοφίαν καὶ σύνεσιν καὶ μὴ παρορῶν ἁμαρτάνοντα, ἀλλὰ θέμενος ἐπὶ σωτηρίᾳ μετάνοιαν· ὁ καταξιώσας ἡμᾶς τοὺς ταπεινοὺς καὶ ἀναξίους δούλους σου καὶ ἐν τῇ ὥρᾳ ταύτῃ στῆναι κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης τοῦ ἁγίου σου θυσιαστηρίου καὶ τὴν ὀφειλομένην σοι προσκύνησιν καὶ δοξολογίαν προσάγειν· Αὐτός, Δέσποτα, πρόσδεξαι καὶ ἐκ στόματος ἡμῶν τῶν ἁμαρτωλῶν τὸν τρισάγιον ὕμνον καὶ ἐπίσκεψαι ἡμᾶς ἐν τῇ χρηστότητί σου. Συγχώρησον ἡμῖν πᾶν πλημμέλημα ἑκούσιόν τε καὶ ἀκούσιον· ἁγίασον ἡμῶν τὰς ψυχὰς καὶ τὰ σώματα· καὶ δὸς ἡμῖν ἐν ὁσιότητι λατρεύειν σοι πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας τῆς ζωῆς ἡμῶν· πρεσβείαις τῆς ἁγίας Θεοτόκου καὶ πάντων τῶν ἁγίων, τῶν ἀπ' αἰῶνός σοι εὐαρεστησάντων.

Ὅτι ἅγιος εἶ ὁ Θεὸς ἡμῶν καὶ σοὶ τὴν δόξαν ἀναπέμπομεν, τῷ Πατρὶ καὶ τῷ Υἱῷ καὶ τῷ Ἁγίῳ Πνεύματι, νῦν καὶ ἀεί.

This is the translation from the same site:
http://www.goarch.org/chapel/liturgical ... anguage=en

Holy God, You dwell among Your saints. You are praised by the Seraphim with the thrice holy hymn and glorified by the Cherubim and worshiped by all the heavenly powers. You have brought all things out of nothing into being. You have created man and woman in Your image and likeness and adorned them with all the gifts of Your grace. You give wisdom and understanding to the supplicant and do not overlook the sinner but have established repentance as the way of salvation. You have enabled us, Your lowly and unworthy servants, to stand at this hour before the glory of Your holy altar and to offer to You due worship and praise. Master, accept the thrice holy hymn also from the lips of us sinners and visit us in Your goodness. Forgive our voluntary and involuntary transgressions, sanctify our souls and bodies, and grant that we may worship and serve You in holiness all the days of our lives, by the intercessions of the holy Theotokos and of all the saints who have pleased You throughout the ages.

For You are holy, our God, and to You we give glory, to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, now and to the ages of ages.

It is immediately evident from the translation that the way that committee (I'm making the assumption) has translated "ὁ ἐν ἁγίοις ἀναπαυόμενος" as "You dwell among Your saints" is good idiomatic English, but I think that in adding the pronoun have changed it from a prayer to a declaration. This has the desired effect of making the one who prays consider the such and so of God, but the undesired effect of bringing the logical (story-telling) thinking into the

As with the verse of the Psalm quoted above, the imperative form is present. Also, the participal form is used to bring an historical event into a description of the Person as it is in the Ephesians passage that we are considering. It seems to be felt that the un-tense-designated, un-mood-specified form can be used in addresses without bringing tense or mood with it.

In short, the passage we are considering in Ephesians with third person pronouns seems to be declarative rather than a prayer. I am interested to know your reasons for considering it a prayer?

I started out on this tack intending to illustrate what has always seemed to me a somewhat sloppy usage of participles in a string of clauses lacking any clear or well-defined pattern of organization. We then moved to the question of the author’s intent; you suggested it might be an outline that could and should have been fleshed out; I was skeptical about that. I suggested that the clauses might conceivably be units strung together in a prayer, perhaps a prayer of thanksgiving such as is sometimes found in the opening of Pauline letters. What I was really thinking of when I spoke of a “prayer”, however, was the kind of relatively inarticulate rambling snippets of doctrinal elements strung together by lay people who have evidently not thought through in advance what they wanted to say – they’ve heard these snippets many times over the years, all of them expressive of a conception of God’s will and providence and cosmic purpose for the salvation of believers. As I’ve noted previously, each of these snippets in this passage of Ephesians is intelligible in itself; what is wanting in the sequence is a clearly-defined structural pattern of arrangement.

You’ve offered an arrangement of Eph 1:3-14 with a view to commenting on the usage of participles and relative- and personal pronouns. You have suggested that the participles are “places where we stop and dwell on the thing that has been mentioned and are able to find out more details,” while “the relatives are about the (linguistically in this passage) peripheral details about the Christ.” I have to say that I’m somewhat skeptical of this differentiation; it seems to me that a participle in the nominative can perform the same function as a clarifying relative clause. I think that participles are often used to add a clarifying adverbial element and that a relative clause may do no more than clarify something about the identity of the one being talked about. I really don’t think we can generalize that much about participles and relative clauses as such; both are powerful instruments in the hands of an artful Greek stylist. The main thing I wanted to say about Eph 1:3-14 is that it is not, in my opinion, the work of an artful Greek stylist, and that the participles are not being used in a manner that clearly articulates an intelligible sequence.

I took a few minutes to make some minor alterations in Eph 1:3-12 with a view to showing how it might be viewed as a prayer of thanksgiving – certainly it’s a “song of praise for works of salvation.” What I’ve done is to transform a couple participles and one indicative 3 sg. into indicative 2 sg. and then to change αὐτοῦ to σου in a few places with appropriate accentual adjustments for the enclitic. What I had in mind here was the formulaic “Baruch Atah … “ with an implicit εἶ added to the opening εὐλογητός.


Eph 1:3-12:
Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ πνευματικῇ ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ, 4 καθὼς ἐξελέξω ἡμᾶς ἐν αὐτῷ πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιόνν σου ἐν ἀγάπῃ, 5 προορίσας ἡμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς αὐτόν, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματός σου, 6 εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης τῆς χάριτός σου ἧς ἐχαρίτωσαας ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἠγαπημένῳ. 7 Ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν διὰ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτοῦ, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωμάτων, κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ 8 ἧς ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς ἡμᾶς, ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ φρονήσει, 9 γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματός σου, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν σου ἣν προέθου ἐν αὐτῷ 10 εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ. 11 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ἐκληρώθημεν προορισθέντες κατὰ πρόθεσιν τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐνεργοῦντος κατὰ τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ 12 εἰς τὸ εἶναι ἡμᾶς εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ τοὺς προηλπικότας ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ.

All of this began with your statement that participial usage really calls for a much more expansive explication of the range of functions and applications of this “workhorse” (that’s what it really is rather than a dumbox “beast of burden.” It does seem to me that the better Greek authors are those that use participles to the best advantage.

Eph 1:3-12:
Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ πνευματικῇ ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ, 4 καθὼς ἐξελέξω ἡμᾶς ἐν αὐτῷ πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιόνν σου ἐν ἀγάπῃ, 5 προορίσας ἡμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς αὐτόν, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματός σου, 6 εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης τῆς χάριτός σου ἧς ἐχαρίτωσαας ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἠγαπημένῳ. 7 Ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν διὰ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτοῦ, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωμάτων, κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ 8 ἧς ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς ἡμᾶς, ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ φρονήσει, 9 γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματός σου, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν σου ἣν προέθου ἐν αὐτῷ 10 εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ. 11 Ἐν ᾧ καὶ ἐκληρώθημεν προορισθέντες κατὰ πρόθεσιν τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐνεργοῦντος κατὰ τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ 12 εἰς τὸ εἶναι ἡμᾶς εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ τοὺς προηλπικότας ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ.

I have found this stretch of text as a condensed highlighting of the doctrine of positional truth (in him). This formula is Paul's favorite expression for positional truth found throughout all his letters. Note that this doctrine stops at verse 12 and picks up again in ch 2.