Monday, December 11, 2023

The next ten

Here we have 

more particles and conjunctions

γάρ

ὅτι

οὐ

μή

another preposition:

 ἐκ

two more sets of pronouns:

οὗτος, αὕτη, τοῦτο  (near demonstrative - 'this, these')

ὅς, ἥ, ὅ  (relative pronoun - 'who/m, which')

an adjective, which can be also used as a pronoun:

πᾶς, πᾶσα, πᾶν

and, finally, two nouns, one a proper noun:

ὁ θεός

ὁ Ἰησοῦς

Ἰησοῦς is, of course, the proper noun 'Jesus', and I note only that there are a few instances in the NT where the name refers to someone other than Jesus of Nazareth.  See, for instance, Acts 7:45, where Ἰησοῦ (in the genitive) refers to the Old Testament patriarch Joshua.

The noun Θεός - 'god, God' - is known from Homer down.  Here is an example of its use in the Iliad (book 17, lines 98-99):

ὁππότ᾽ ἀνὴρ ἐθέλῃ πρὸς δαίμονα φωτὶ μάχεσθαι
ὅν κε θεὸς τιμᾷτάχα οἱ μέγα πῆμα κυλίσθη

if I should flout heaven and fight a mortal

who has a god's backing, defeat is certain 

 - (translation by Herbert Jordan, 2008)

In the New Testament the meanings of θεός range from any sort of divine being, or beings, to the capitalized 'God' of the Jewish and Christian peoples.

Here's an example of the first use, from Paul's well-known address to the Athenians:

εὗρον καὶ βωμὸν ἐν ᾧ ἐπεγέγραπτο ΑΓΝΩΣΤΩ ΘΕΩ

I even found and altar with this inscription: 'To an unknown god'   (Acts 17:23)

In a subsequent post we'll look at the full declension of θεός, and consider additional examples of its use in the New Testament.

2 comments:

  1. I was wondering if you were aware of an Attic version of the New testament. I heard about it a few years ago. If you have any information on that, I would appreciate it. Thank you. Lws39@juno.com

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  2. Ah, interesting. I had not heard of this. I have a modern Greek translation, but nothing in Attic. If I hear of anything, I'll let you know!

    ReplyDelete

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