Sunday, January 25, 2009

I'm reading through the Epistle to Diognetus in the Greek. Or, at least, I'm trying to. I'm in chapter 3, and was really scratching my head on the end of verse 5 in comparison with Lake's translation:

τῶν μὲν μὴ δυναμένοις τῆς τιμῆς μεταλαμβάνειν, τῶν δὲ δοκούντων παρέχειν τῷ· μηδενὸς προσδεομένῳ.
For it seems that the one offer to those who cannot partake of the honour, the others to him who is in need of nothing. (Lake)
the latter make offerings to things unable to receive the honor, while the former think they offer it to the One who is in need of nothing. (Holmes)
one group giving to gods who cannot receive the honor, the other thinking that it can provide something to the one who needs nothing. (Ehrman)
For the one class seem to offer sacrifices to things unable to partake of the honour, the other to Him who is in need of nothing. (Meecham, emphasis his)

Thankfully I've got Meecham's edition (from 1949, the last available critical edition in English) where he includes the note:

The text is corrupt. See Otto's full note. Stephanus reads τα μη δυναμενα. So Gildersleeve. Geffcken follows Wilamowitz' rdg. των μεν τοισ η δυναμενοις. For further emendations, see Blakeney (p. 42). We adopt the text printed by Funk, Lightfoot, and Lake, following Gebhardt. For the grammatical construction of the sentence see p. 13. (Meecham, 103).

Here's p. 13:

In general, the author's syntax is correct and careful. Some laxity, however, is seen in iii.5, where the sentence των μεν κτλ. is isolated, being either an irregular genit. abs. or a clause loosely attached to the preceding genit. των ... ενδεικνυμενων.

So that helps, somewhat. Recorded here so I don't have to look it up in Meecham again.

Post Author: rico
Sunday, January 25, 2009 4:38:52 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00) 

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