εἰ μήτι with the subjunctive (Lk 9:13)
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This is a beginner's forum - see the Koine Greek forum for more advanced discussion of Greek texts. Please quote the Greek text you are discussing directly in your post if it is reasonably short - do not ask people to look it up.
When answering questions in this forum, keep it simple, and aim your responses to the level of the person asking the question.
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monte.mackey
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- Joined: November 21st, 2015, 12:35 am
εἰ μήτι with the subjunctive (Lk 9:13)
Could this be legitimately translated as a question? εἰ μήτι πορευθέντες ἡμεῖς ἀγοράσωμεν εἰς πάντα τὸν λαὸν τοῦτον βρώματα. Trans: Unless we go, can we buy food for all these people? Luke 9:13 Thanks, MM
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Dustin Trampe
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- Joined: December 13th, 2017, 12:33 pm
Re: εἰ μήτι with the subjunctive (Lk 9:13)
Moderator Note I'm going to go ahead and approve this post, but please contact a moderator about changing your screen name to match your real name (a requirement for continued posting).
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I don't think so. Here is my reasoning:
the εἰ makes this clause dependent on the previous clause. If I understand your question though, you are wondering if εἰ μήτι πορευθέντες can stand as a dependent clause to ἀγοράσωμεν.... This would be a very irregular construction, since εἰ doesnt to my knowledge take a participle alone (i.e. an εἰ clause describing an action should have a verb). Plus, it is more natural to read μήτι first as μή τι, the τι in this case being abverbial (not something, but somehow). So the sense is, "Unless somehow we go...", thus emphasizing the difficulty of such a possibility.
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I don't think so. Here is my reasoning:
the εἰ makes this clause dependent on the previous clause. If I understand your question though, you are wondering if εἰ μήτι πορευθέντες can stand as a dependent clause to ἀγοράσωμεν.... This would be a very irregular construction, since εἰ doesnt to my knowledge take a participle alone (i.e. an εἰ clause describing an action should have a verb). Plus, it is more natural to read μήτι first as μή τι, the τι in this case being abverbial (not something, but somehow). So the sense is, "Unless somehow we go...", thus emphasizing the difficulty of such a possibility.