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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | WHERE TO FIND ALL THE NAMES OF GOD | Ps 83:18 | Truthfinder | 75657 | ||
John 8:58 Hi Tim, What's your understanding of how this verse should be most accurately translated, in a strictly literal way, since English isn't an aspectual language and Greek is? Remember to be completely time indifferent and grammatically correct, when you translate it. I'll show you how I would translate it(in Hebrew, Spanish, and of course in English) and why. Take your time, and be as comprehensive as you like. Please provide parts of speech, as I will understand. :) Truthfinder |
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2 | WHERE TO FIND ALL THE NAMES OF GOD | Ps 83:18 | Morant61 | 75676 | ||
Greetings Truthfinder! Two quick points before I translate John 8:58. 1) What do you mean when you say that Greek is aspectual? I am not familiar with that term. 2) Why would I have to be completely time indifferent, since Greek is not time indifferent? It has past, present, perfect, and future tenses. Here is my translation, with the parsing of the verbs: "He said (Aorist, Active, Indicative, 3rd Person, Singular) to them Jesus, 'Truly, truly I say (Present, Active, Indicative, 1st Person, Singular) to you, before Abraham was born (Aorist, Middle Deponent, Infinitive)I I am (Present, Active, Indicative, 1st Person, Singular)." A smoothed out translation would be: "Jesus said to them, 'Truly, Truly I say to you before Abraham was born I am'" There isn't any doubt as to what Jesus was doing in this verse. He uses the exact phrase that Jehovah used of Himself in Ex. 3:14, as translated by the LXX. What was the question to which Jesus was responding? They had asked Him how He could have seen Abraham, since He was not even 50 years old. His answer, "I AM". I was "I AM" before Abraham was even born. "I AM" even now. What was their response to His answer? They tried to stone Him for blasphemy. The real problem for the NWT is that is does not want people to make the connection between John 8:58 and Ex. 3:14. So, an attempt is made to say that "I am" is ungrammatical. But, Jesus was not attempting to be grammatical. He was responding to their question by saying that He was God, using the title "I AM". I have read the defenses that the JW's have put out for their translation and I don't buy it. But, even if one could buy their defense, how would you explain that Jesus uses this same title in John 8:28. In that verse, Jesus says that after they have killed Him that they will come to know that "I AM". Didn't they already know that He existed? Would we translate this verse as "I have been"? They killed Him, of course they knew that He existed. What they would come to know about Him was His identity as the "I AM" of Ex. 3:14. p.s. - I have asked this question a couple of times on the forum, but how could Jesus be 'a god' when God says in Is. 43:10 that there are no other gods? Your Brother in Christ, Tim Moran |
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3 | WHERE TO FIND ALL THE NAMES OF GOD | Ps 83:18 | Truthfinder | 76071 | ||
Hi Tim, You wrote: Two quick points before I translate John 8:58. 1) What do you mean when you say that Greek is aspectual? I am not familiar with that term. Fact is, there are many linguists that deal in the finer nuances of the verbal systems of the biblical languages. Modern linguistic principles dictate considerable improvement in appreciating the original ideas of the Biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. I appreciate the logic, sound reasoning and considerable Bibliography, of author and university lecturer Rolf Furuli of no less than 25 years. He explains that the basic difference between the verbal systems is that in Greek, “aspect” is grammaticalized and this is also true in Hebrew, but not in English. Now, grammaticalization means that a particular grammatical characteristic is connected with the verb form and is not dependent upon the context. He goes on to say, “Most linguistic works on English say that English has aspects, but this is because aspect is used in a sense different from how it is used in this study (See J. Hewson and V. Bubenik, Tense and Aspect in Indo-European Languages, see also Current Issues in Linguistic Theory (Amsterdam: J. Benamins, 1997). P. 145) If “aspects” are defined as “viewpoints,” the perfective one being a focus encompassing both the beginning and the end of an event or state, and the imperfective one being a focus on a small sequence after the beginning and before the end, then English is capable of expressing aspects. But there is no English form, the purpose of which is exclusively to express aspect. Both in Hebrew and Greek, the fundamental parts of the verbal system are exclusively aspectual and their area of use are much broader than that of simple past and past continuous, which in English are used to express viewpoint. So, while both English and Hebrew/Greek are capable of expressing durative and punctual viewpoints, their fundamental role in the verbal system and their completely different areas of use, make Hebrew and Greek aspects qualitatively different from what is called “aspect” in English. 2) Why would I have to be completely time indifferent, since Greek is not time indifferent? It has past, present, perfect, and future tenses. Again, only in an in depth study of the “Excursus on Hebrew and Greek Verbs” is this made apparent to Greek and Hebrew language studies. The concept of “tense” is defined as “the grammaticalization of location in time.” (See B. Comrie, Tense; Cambridge University Press, 1985, p. 7) This means that whether the time of the verbal action is past, present or future, related to speech time or to some other time, it is seen by the verb form itself and not by the context alone. Thus, the words “went” and “taught”, in English, are past tense. Given Comrie’s definition of “tense,” neither Hebrew nor Greek have tenses, save possibly Greek future, which is viewed by most researchers as a tense. (See S. Porter, Verbal Aspect in the Greek of the New Testament, with Reference to Tense and Mood 1993, pp. 76-83. Porter denies that tense is grammaticalized at all in New Testament Greek.) The word “tense,” for Hebrew perfect and imperfect, or Greek present, aorist or imperfect really is a misnomer, though it still is used in most studies on the Greek verb and in some studies on the Hebrew verb. All the three recent dissertations on the Greek verb (Porter, Fanning and Olsen--A Semantic and Pragmatic Model of Lexical and Grammatical Aspect- differentiate between tense and time in a fine way. D. B. Wallace has a very fine discussion of this subject in his Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament -- Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996, pp. 504-510. The valuable Hebrew syntax written by Waltke and O’Connor -- An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax by Eisenbrauns, 1990 also distinguishes between time and tense. However, the recent comparative grammar of the Semitic languages written by E. Lipinski, Analecta 80; Leuven: Uitgiveij Peeters en Departement Oosterse Studies, 1997, while generally having a high quality, takes for granted that verbs in Hebrew having past meaning also have past tense. It is methodologically unsound to draw such a conclusion, since the past time can be a function of the context (thus being pragmatic) just as well as being a function of the verb (thus being semantic). Therefore, serious Hebrew and Greek linguists avoid using the “tense” but instead “conjugations” and speak of Greek present and Greek imperfect without adding the word “tense.” This is all well discussed and illustrated by Furuli. Truthfinder |
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4 | WHERE TO FIND ALL THE NAMES OF GOD | Ps 83:18 | Morant61 | 76093 | ||
Greetings Truthfinder! These articles sound like the kind of 'way too much detail' that scholars sometimes enjoy! :-) But, seriously... 1) To state this more simply, it sounds like your saying that kind of action is more important in Greek than time of action. 2) This one I disagree with. I would readily agree that Greek 'tenses' are more pliable and complex than tenses in English. But, they are real nonetheless. Well, on to your other posts! Your Brother in Christ, Tim Moran |
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