rough breathing on αὐτοὺς Rev. 8:6 ?

[Stirling Bartholomew]

Rev. 8:6 Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν.

H.B. Swete, R.H. Charles and others including a minority of the "committee" Metxger TextCom 1stEd. prefer the rough breathing on αὐτοὺς. Metzger says "Despite what appears to be Hellenistic usage a minority of the committee strongly prefers the use of the rough breathing on αὐτοὺς."

What is this all about? What does Hellenistic usage refer to in this context?

[Stirling Bartholomew]

Rev. 8:6 Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν.

H.B. Swete, R.H. Charles and others including a minority of the "committee" Metxger TextCom 1stEd. prefer the rough breathing on αὐτοὺς. Metzger says "Despite what appears to be Hellenistic usage a minority of the committee strongly prefers the use of the rough breathing on αὐτοὺς."

What is this all about? What does Hellenistic usage refer to in this context?

Two minutes after posting I found Danker's (3rd Ed) discussion of this p268 under εαυτου 1st paragraph. Also J.H. Moulton vol.2 p181, and Metxger's comments on Phil 3:21 TextCom 1stEd page 615-616. I am still somewhat befuddled by the question "what is at stake here?", it seems that there is some contradiction or merely confusion in the different treatments. One treatment is semantic, saying that αὐτοὺς in the Hellenistic period expanded to overlap with the semantic domains of εαυτου. Other treatments seem to be focused simply on orthography (not semantic issues) saying that in some mss at some dates and locations the epsilon in εαυτου was omitted. I am really interested in the semantic issue but you really can not totally divorce the semantic issue from the spelling issue.

help with this question would be appreciated.

[Stirling Bartholomew]

One treatment is semantic, saying that αὐτοὺς in the Hellenistic period expanded to overlap with the semantic domains of εαυτου. .

Perhaps I have not understood what Danker and others are saying. At first I thought they were claiming that αὐτοὺς had expanded to include reflexive usage overlapping with εαυτου. Now I wonder if that is really the case. Two more places to look, Moule Idioms p119 and Louw & Nida footnote #11 on page 818, §92.37 which I will cut and paste here:

11 Note the overlap between αὐτόςb (92.11) and αὐτόςc (92.37). αὐτόςb serves essentially as a reference to the third person, both singular and plural, and only in the nominative form does it carry emphasis. This could very well be classified as an instance of αὐτόςc. In the oblique cases there is no such emphasis. On the other hand, αὐτόςc may be an adjunct to any lexical item in an oblique case and, as such, carries emphasis.

Impossible to make sense out of this w/o seeing a b c:

58.31 αὐτός a, ή, ό (occurring with the article): pertaining to that which is identical to something — ‘same.’ προσηύξατο τὸν αὐτὸν λόγον εἰπών ‘he prayed, saying the same thing’ Mk 14:39; οὐχὶ καὶ οἱ τελῶναι τὸ αὐτὸ ποιοῦσιν; ‘do not even the tax collectors do the same thing?’ Mt 5:46.

92.11 αὐτός b, ή, ό: a reference to a definite person or persons spoken or written about (with an added feature of emphasis in the nominative forms) — ‘he, him, she, her, it, they, them.’ αὐτὸς γὰρ σώσει τὸν λαὸν αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν αὐτῶν ‘for he will save his people from their sins’ Mt 1:21; καὶ οὗτος μὴν ἕκτος ἐστὶν αὐτῇ τῇ καλουμένῃ στείρᾳ ‘and this was the sixth month for her who was called barren’ Lk 1:36; αὐτῶν τὴν συνείδησιν ‘their conscience’ 1Cor 8:12; καὶ κρατήσας τῆς χειρὸς τοῦ παιδίου λέγει αὐτῇ ‘and taking the child by the hand, he said to her’ Mk 5:41.

92.37 αὐτός c, ή, ό: a marker of emphasis by calling attention to the distinctiveness of the lexical item with which it occurs (used for all persons, genders, and numbers) — ‘-self, -selves’ (for example, myself, yourself, yourselves, ourselves, himself, herself, itself, themselves).11 πέπεισμαι δέ, ἀδελφοί μου, καὶ αὐτὸς ἐγὼ περὶ ὑμῶν ‘my fellow believers, I myself am persuaded concerning you’ Ro 15:14; αὐτὸς Δαυὶδ εἶπεν ἐν τῷ πνεύματι τῷ ἁγίῳ ‘David himself spoke by means of the Holy Spirit’ Mk 12:36.

I am still somewhat less than perfectly clear about this. I need to sort this out for a project I am working on. Particularly the semantic impact of reflexive pronoun vs non-reflexive. I suspect it would involve a change of referent from the trumpets to the Angels:

NKJV Rev. 8:6   So the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound. based on the Maj/TR Reading ητοιμασαν εαυτους ινα σαλπισωσιν.

NRSV Rev. 8:6   Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets made ready to blow them. NA27 ἡτοίμασαν αὐτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν

Now my question is, which breathing of αυτους lies behind the NRSV? I am assuming that it is the smooth breathing?

Comments?

[timothy_p_mcmahon]

How could αυτους refer back to feminine σαλπιγγας? Another Revelation solecism?

[Stirling Bartholomew]

How could αυτους refer back to feminine σαλπιγγας? Another Revelation solecism?

Yes, it would be a syntax error. Not a rare event in Apoc. of John. But perhaps we shouldn't assume errors when there are other options. Right?

If we assume that the text will honor the rules of concord at this point, then what is the impact of the breathing on the translation? At this point I am too close to the problem to see the answer. It is probably perfectly obvious but after fogging my brain by reading half a dozen grammars I can't get a handle on it.

[Pat Ferguson]

Perhaps a comparison of the Greek verb seen at Rev. 8:6 in P115, 01 and 02 might be helpful?

[Stephen Hughes]

How could αυτους refer back to feminine σαλπιγγας? Another Revelation solecism?

Yes, it would be a syntax error. Not a rare event in Apoc. of John. But perhaps we shouldn't assume errors when there are other options. Right?

Syntax errors in the Book of Revelations is sometimes thrown about as a by-word or a panacea for dealing with difficulties. Before we can draw an inference about a possible syntax error, let's consider the syntax...

To go with what you and the NRSV are suggesting that the αὐτούς might also be on the "wrong" side of the ἵνα? Then we would have to deal with two grammatical errors: It is masculine not faiminine and it's on the wrong side of ἵνα - Most unlikely. To do what TPMc suggests, the verse might read like

Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν αὐτάς

Logically, it would be possible to have the pronoun repeated after ἡτοίμασαν as

Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτὰς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν αὐτάς

But that would not be the Greek idiom.

To see why we should omit the first αὐτάς not the second (which may or may not seem like good English) we could look at the following verse.

Ποῦ θέλεις ἀπελθόντες ἑτοιμάσωμεν ἵνα φάγῃς τὸ Πάσχα;

which an English speaker would possibly have translated into Greek as

Ποῦ θέλεις ἀπελθόντες ἑτοιμάσωμεν τὸ Πάσχα ἵνα φάγῃς αὐτό;

A way that somebody might have reached that conclusion might be that they would say that the "normal" construction for ἑτοιμάσαι is;

• ἑτοιμάσαι + acc (of thing prepared) + dat (of for whom it is prepared)

and the ἵνα clause is just added onto the end.

But actually, the basic construction when ἑτοιμάσαι has an object and what is made ready to be done is specified is;

• ἑτοιμάσαι + ἵνα + subjunctive + object

That is to say - in answer to TPMc's question and the NRSV translation comittee's choice - that αὐτούς would not refer back to σαλπίνγας on structural grounds.

In the case of

Πορευθέντες ἑτοιμάσατε ἡμῖν τὸ Πάσχα, ἵνα φάγωμεν.

the dative (of for whom it is prepared) is included. If we wanted to make the pronoun we have apply to the σάλπιγγας, and we wanted to spell out the dative (of for whom they are prepared), then our verse would become

Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτὰς ἑαυτοῖς / αὐτοῖς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν

[Ι'm sorry, I don't know the language well enough to predict whether ἑαυτοῖς or αὐτοῖς would be used, but I'm 90% sure it would be ἑαυτοῖς in the better Greek of the time, and possible in the not-so-better Greek of the time - but of course I would not be surprised at either of them turning up wherever.]

To codify that, the construction for ἑτοιμάσαι when there is an accusative (of the thing prepared) and a dative (of for whom it is prepared) and what is made ready to be done is specified is;

• ἑτοιμάσαι + acc (of thing prepared) + dat (of for whom it is prepared) + ἵνα + subjunctive

You can make your own rule, I'm sure for the constuction we see in;

Ποῦ θέλεις ἑτοιμάσομέν σοι φαγεῖν τὸ Πάσχα;

[Hint: see the last line of this post if you can't see the pattern.]

Now that we have seen that it is not something that is being prepared, that is to say that the construction suggests that it is not an external object that they are actively (verbal sense) making ready, the only thing left for it to refer to is reflexively to the angels themselves.

Having said all that, given that the dative was dropping out of the language, AND given the possibility for grammatical error in the Book of Revelations, it could be possible that the accusative is here used for dative. That is unlikely because ἑτοιμάσαι is rare in the active voice with a dative without an accusative (in the New Testament at least)[except Luke 9:52 where ξενίαν may have been understood as a collocation]. But if it was accusative for dative (which I don't think it is) then αὐτούς could be translated as "for themselves", but that doesn't even fit the sense.

There is the example of this dative without the accusative in

ἐκεῖ ἑτοιμάσατε ἡμῖν.

but (a) the "τὸ Πάσχα." is understood from context, and is explicated in the following verse;

καὶ ἡτοίμασαν τὸ Πάσχα.

where the narrative leaves out the (possible) αὐτοις that we would expect in English. (cf. Luke 22:9, 12, 13 if you want a further example)

---------
For the similar construction, cf.

Ποῦ θέλεις ἑτοιμάσομέν σοι φαγεῖν τὸ Πάσχα;

The general word for place is τόπος, while the word ταμεῖον is a "secret (locked) room", and ἀνάγαιον is an "upstairs room" (ξενία as just mentioned is a "guest's lodgings"). We can see in this construction that the dative also doesn't migrate to the other side of the second verb in the same way that it didn't with the ἵνα constructions.

[Stephen Hughes]

Perhaps a comparison of the Greek verb seen at Rev. 8:6 in P115, 01 and 02 might be helpful?

Could you spell this out please. I'm sorry, I don't have access to the verb you are referring to.

[Stirling Bartholomew]

Perhaps a comparison of the Greek verb seen at Rev. 8:6 in P115, 01 and 02 might be helpful?

Could you spell this out please. I'm sorry, I don't have access to the verb you are referring to.

Rev. 8:6 in P115
[και] [οι] [ζ̅] αγ[γελοι] ο̣ι̣ εχοντες τα[ς] [ζ̅] [σαλπιγγας] [ητοιμασαν] εα̣[υτους] [ινα] [σαλ]π̣ισω[σιν]

Source Munster http://nttranscripts.uni-muenster.de/An ... +start.anv

[Stephen Hughes]

Perhaps a comparison of the Greek verb seen at Rev. 8:6 in P115, 01 and 02 might be helpful?

Could you spell this out please. I'm sorry, I don't have access to the verb you are referring to.

Rev. 8:6 in P115
[και] [οι] [ζ̅] αγ[γελοι] ο̣ι̣ εχοντες τα[ς] [ζ̅] [σαλπιγγας] [ητοιμασαν] εα̣[υτους] [ινα] [σαλ]π̣ισω[σιν]

Source Munster http://nttranscripts.uni-muenster.de/An ... +start.anv

This source - as Maubrey (I recall) pointed out - doesn't include the Byzantine tradition, so at present doesn't give a very definitive overview of text forms. It does show us that εαυτους exists in manuscripts.

Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν.

Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets made ready to blow them.

You would have to look at the working notes of the translation committee to determine when in the translation process this form of the translation was arrived at. There is often a person with no knowledge of the original who goes through and rejects un-English sounding translations, and who brings the translations up to standard as a work of English literature, so to speak.

I'm sure you could imagine such a process for yourself. My imagined one is;

• Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι οἱ ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν αὐτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσιν.
  "literal" translation
• And the seven angels the having the seven trumpets made ready them in order that they might blow the trupet.
  add a relative for an article, add a pronoun because blow is transitive (not absolute) in English
• And the seven angels who had the seven trumpets made them ready to blow them.
  Aversion to starting sentences with "And", delete one of the "them"s to make it better English.
• Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets made ready to blow them.

As to whether "them" got confused in the gender in the English, or whether it was a speculation of bad grammar in the Greek before translation, we would have to see inside the NRSV committee's notes. Is that something that is possible to do?