Thursday, December 07, 2006

No, I'm not starting some "Quote of the Day" feature. But here's a good excerpt from Robertson's Grammar (did you know it is available from Logos?) that I had to post:

It is not necessary to give in detail many examples of the articular inf. in the N. T. I merely wish to repeat that, when the article does occur with the inf., it should have its real force. Often this will make extremely awkward English, as in Lu. 2:27, ἐν τῷ εἰσαγαγεῖν τοὺς γονεῖς τὸ παιδίον. But the Greek has no concern about the English or German. It is simply slovenliness not to try to see the thing from the Greek standpoint. But we are not to make a slavish rendering. Translation should be idiomatic. It is hardly worth while to warn the inept that there is no connection between the article τό and the English to in a sentence like Ph. 1:21, ἑμοὶ γὰρ τὸ ζῆν Χριστὸς καὶ τὸ ἀποθανεῖν κέρδος. Here the article τό has just the effect that the Greek article has with any abstract substantive, that of distinction or contrast. Life and death (living and dying) are set over against each other. See further Mt. 24:45; Lu. 24:29; Ac. 3:12; 10:25; 14:9; 21:12; 25:11; Ro. 4:11, 13, 16, 18; 13:8; 14:21; 2 Cor. 8:10 f.; 9:1; Ph. 1:23, 29; 2:6; 4:10; 1 Th. 3:2 f.
Robertson, A. (1919; 2006). A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research (1065). Logos.

Update (2006-12-08): Really, this isn't going to be a daily feature. I just read another good one and need to blog it. This is from Donald Guthrie's essay, "The Development of the Idea of Canonical Pseudepigraphy in New Testament Criticism" (available online at BiblicalStudies.org.uk):

... The fact is that Baur's literary criticism was dominated by his dogmatic presuppositions and since these had to be maintained at all costs, it was no embarassment that pseudepigraphic writings became more normal in the extant Pauline Canon than genuine works. (Guthrie, p. 46)

Post Author: rico
Thursday, December 07, 2006 11:32:47 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00) 

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