Re: [TruthTalk] Christian Perfection

[Wm. Taylor]

David wrote  >  Ok, so I share this information from the Interlinears so you can criticize them or correct them where you think it appropriate.  Also, I share it so that we can be on the same page in discussing this phrase.  It now seems to me that you have not dealt with that word hoti which both translators render as that.  Perhaps you can give us your own translation of this entire Greek phrase.  If you omit translating any of the words other than the definite article modifying Theou, please explain.   David, I am happy with either of the transliterations you provide. Let us remember though that a transliteration is not a step in the process of translation. Transliteration is something like DOS For Dummies: it's a decent way to get Greek over into English font, but it is inferior in every way to an actual reading of Greek; in other words, there is much more to reading Greek than simply knowing how to identify symbols. The same holds true for translating Greek into English. Word order is important to English syntax, but much less so to Greek. Those who knew how to write well in Greek were much more intuned to assonance and alliteration than we are in our writing. Word order in Greek is always secondary to grammatical rules. Many times the nominative appears after the predicate and sometimes even after the accusative. Greek allowed for this because of case endings. No matter where the word appears in a statement the case ending signifies its use. For this reason writers of Greek could be much more creative in there use of other literary devices. It makes for beautiful Greek, but it causes problems for translators of Greek. We English speakers sometimes have to break some of our conventions to get to the thrust of a Greek thought. One of those problems presents itself in this verse. It is a question of what do we do with pas: Which way do we go with it in our translation? Pas is nominative. It modifies nominatives. There are two nominatives in 18a; the verb oidamen, which is first person plural and carries the subject of the sentence, and the participle gegennamenos. The interpretive task in translating this clause is to decide which of the two nominatives to modify. In regards to this, I was quite upfront with you in my earlier post. Allow me to be upfront with you again. I chose to modify the first person plural because of the question raised later in the verse concerning who it is who "keeps himself." Not even the born-from-above, Spirit-filled Christian keeps himself from the evil one. Christ is keeps him through the indwelling strength of the Holy Spirit. This is always, always true. John knew this better than anyone. I do not believe him to be suggesting anything to the contrary -- he was after all one of the disciples whom satan had asked to sift. He saw with his own eyes how quickly Peter had denied Jesus. He got the object of the lesson: strength and protection against the wicked one are in Christ through the Holy Spirit. I bring my knowledge of these truths from the Gospels of Christ with me to my translation of John's epistle. I do not apologize for that. And so you or any Greek scholar are welcome to disagree with my rendering of these Greek words. I ask only that you be honest enough to consider what you are bringing with you when you go to the same text and begin to translate.   Blessing,      Bill  ----- Original Message ----- From: David Miller To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, April 10, 2004 7:48 AM Subject: RE: [TruthTalk] Christian Perfection Bill, I appreciate the thoroughness of your response.  It went much deeper than was actually needed.  I hope you did not spend too much time on it, but I do appreciate you explaining more thoroughly your perspective here.   I have a much better idea now of what is going on in your mind to translate the text as you have.  Your perspective on this verse actually came up on TruthTalk some years back, but nobody understood Greek enough to justify the translation.  You have brought this much further along than I have ever seen it dealt with before.  I cannot thank you enough for doing that.   One matter that helped clarify things was your identifying ho as a definite article that you associate with gegennemenos.  It also helped for you to explain that you view pas as a modifier of oidamen.  I will have a criticism of this to express a little bit later.   There still seems to be one word in the passage that you seem to ignore, and I have a follow up question about your understanding of pas.  Let's consider the entire Greek phrase now so I can more fully appreciate your viewpoint.  I don't want to miss out on anything going on in that great mind of yours.  :-)   The Greek phrase that we seem to need to focus on is:   Oidamen hoti pas ho gegennemenos ek tou Theou ouch hamartanei   This phrase appears to be the same in both the Majority Text Greek Bible and the Nestle Aland Greek Bible.    I have a Greek Interlinear from the United Bible Societies Fourth Edition, translated by Robert K. Brown and Philip W. Comfort, which renders it this way:   Oidamen hoti pas ho gegennemenos ek tou Theou ouch hamartanei   We know that everyone having been born of – God does not continually sin   I have underlined the Greek and English words that go together since it is difficult to try and line the text up.   I have another Greek Interlinear by George Ricker Berry which is based upon Stephens’ text.  He renders the passage this way:   Oidamen hoti pas ho gegennemenos ek tou Theou ouch hamartanei   We know that anyone that has been begotten of God not sins   Berry numbers the words so that it should actually read as: "We know that not anyone that has been begotten of God sins."   Ok, so I share this information from the Interlinears so you can criticize them or correct them where you think it appropriate.  Also, I share it so that we can be on the same page in discussing this phrase.  It now seems to me that you have not dealt with that word hoti which both translators render as that.  Perhaps you can give us your own translation of this entire Greek phrase.  If you omit translating any of the words other than the definite article modifying Theou, please explain.   In regards to pas, I have a criticism in that its number does not agree with the noun you claim it modifies.  Isn’t it true that Oidamen is plural whereas pas is singular?  Don’t you see this as a problem? Some explanation here would be appreciated.   If you have an explanation for the number not agreeing, maybe you can do the following for me.  Pas is a very common Greek word translated over 1200 times.  Can you give me one or two verses where this word is used in the elative sense that you consider it to be used here?  You said that you consider it to modify oidamen in this passage.  Maybe by looking at some other verses where it is used this way will help me accept your perspective.   I consider 1 John 5:1 to have a similar construction of Greek words, and so I would like to see you translate the first part of it.  The Greek reads:   Pas ho pistenon hoti Iesous estin ho Christos   I see this as saying literally, "Everyone believing that Jesus is the Christ" or "Everyone that believes that Jesus is the Christ."  How would you translate this passage?  Notice the pas ho phrase similar to 1 John 5:18.  You might also compare 1 John 3:6, 9, 15 which also have this pas ho construction.  I look forward to your comments when you have time.  I will be gone most of the day today.   Peace be with you. David Miller, Beverly Hills, Florida.