ἐνθύμησις

We’ve Killed Deponency! Where Next?

Posted on November 21, 2012 by jacobcerone

For many of you, the title of this post will likely make you turn tail and run to another site in order to kill time before vacation starts. I wouldn’t blame you. After all, what is deponency and why should I care?

For those of you that are still with me, “deponency” is a word from the Latin “de” + “pono” meaning “to lay aside.” The word is used to describe Latin words that “lay aside” the middle voice and are to be translated as active verbs. The term is later used to explain a tricky phenomenon in Greek. Certain words in Greek only have middle endings and do not have active endings: ερχομαι, δεχομαι, and πορευομαι, to name a few. Grammarians have used the category of deponency to say that words such as these have laid aside their middle meaning and should be translated as active verbs. My Greek Grammar I professor described deponent verbs as “wolves in sheep’s clothing.”

Well, after eleven years of discussion within the SBL Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics Section, Cynthia Westfall, Jonathan Pennington, Bernard Taylor, and Rutger Allan have observed the corpse of deponency, said some parting words, and pronounced the category dead on Monday November 19th at 1:00PM; they killt it. As hostile as the terminology may seem, they made it clear from the outset that they mean no hostility towards those of the old guard. They are simply looking for a way forward in “how to teach the middle voice.”

The session was interesting. I thought it was a little rash to pronounce deponency dead. I just showed up to this party; but it turns out the party has dragged on like a bad SNL sketch. For this reason, I’m not capable of providing a lucid account of the proceedings here. Instead, I will give a few highlights.

Pennington argued that the MP forms communicate subject effectedness.
Deponency was never a category Greeks used to explain “deponent” verbs. It only came around after extensive contact with the Latin language.
Pennington was also generous to the old grammarians. He specifically cites Dr. Black’s Learn to Read New Testament Greek and others and says that he was encouraged that they have treated the category with nuance lacking in previous grammars.

I will conclude with this. I eagerly await Dr. Black’s Advanced Greek Grammar class. We will be discussing current issues in Greek Grammar. On second thought, Dr. Black, I’m not sure if you intended to address the matter of deponency next semester…you might want to reconsider… it isn’t all that current anymore…its…well…dead 😉

Posted in Greek Resources, New Testament Studies, NT Greek | Tagged Deponency | 3 Comments

LXX Pentateuch, Clitics, and Larry Perkins

Posted on November 19, 2012 by jacobcerone

Yesterday was the first IOSCS (International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies) seminar of the conference. This session, and subsequent sessions like it, is what I have been looking forward to.

Dr. Larry Perkins presented on the interpretive significance of the shift of clitic word order within LXX Pentateuch. For those of you that does know, a clitic is “a word pronounced with so little emphasis that it is shortened and forms part of the preceding word. In Greek, these words are most often the first and second person pronouns (μου and σου).

Perkins seeks to explain the significance of those instances where the normal Hebrew word order (noun + possessive pronoun) is reversed in the LXX (possessive pronoun + noun). He notes that in these instances the translator has broken from his standard modality of isomorphism. That is to say, the translator’s standard practice is to translate each Hebrew word with an equal stereotyped Greek word in the original Hebrew word order: ביתי = οίκος μου or “my house.”

Perkins contends that when the translator reverses the order from οίκος μου to μου οίκος, that translator has recognized and is so marking a significant development within the narrative. He is marking the text for significance: look at me, pay attention, I’m important! If Perkins is right, and I believe he is, we need to rethink our conception of the translator as a slave to the Hebrew original. Yes, the translator sticks close to the Hebrew parent, but he is skilled. He knows the text. He knows what he has already translated, and he knows what is next.

Talk about a close reading of the text on the part of both the translator and Dr. Perkins. I wonder if I will find the same practice in the text of Ezekiel next semester.

Posted in Greek Resources, LXX, Old Testament Studies | 1 Comment

The Theological Significance of Wirkungsgeschichte/Reception History

Posted on November 18, 2012 by jacobcerone

Yesterday morning I stumbled into the “Theological Interpretation of Scripture Seminar” on “The Theological Significance of Wirkungsgeschicte/Reception History. I knew that Stephen Fowl would be good, but did not realize that I was in the company of a number of heavy hitters. Rusty Reno, the general editor of the Brazos Theological Commentary Series, presented. John Thompson, the author of newest Genesis commentary within the Reformation Commentary Series also presented.

What follows are brief summaries of what I found to be the more interesting aspects of each of these presenters’ presentations.

Stephen Fowl’s paper, Effective-history and the Cultivation of Wise Interpreters, addressed the interpretive practices of pre-modern interpreters and how modern interpreters have appropriated their works. Fowl notes that the use of pre-modern interpreters by modern interpreters is disappointing. If they are used, they are called upon for their theological formulations. In other instances, brief snippets are collected based upon the uniqueness or applicability to the conversation at hand. Despite all the use of the Fathers in modern commentaries, the one thing that is lacking is the utilization of premodern methods and habits of exegesis. That is not to say that we should uncritically accept the all the methodological practices of the early church. Scholarship has changed and we should take note of that. Though Fowl does not provide detailed examples of how this should look in practice, he does not that we should hold both modern interpretive practices and premodern interpretive practices together. They should exist together in a theological interpretation of Scripture within commentaries.

The final presenter for the session, John Thompson, mainly discussed the process involved in writing a commentary for the Reformation Commentary Series. He posed the question, “How does one avoid subjectivity when selecting material for a commentary of this nature?” His conclusion, you don’t. He selected ~1500 paragraphs, only ~900 of which made the cutting room floor. In selecting material, he tried to eliminate the polemical material (though not entirely so as to avoid wholesale sanitation), listen for the minority voice, and at the same time provide an overall representative swath of Reformation exegesis. The presentation was excellent and informative.

I found these two presentations, when considered in light of one another, to be…interesting. I have long considered the worth of the Ancient Christian Commentary series as well as the Reformation Commentary Series. Try as they may, authors cannot avoid removing exegetical statements from the overall method and argumentation of the larger work. Isn’t this exactly what Fowl is talking about? We have taken bits here and there but have not internalized methods and habits. We are only looking in, like peeping Toms, on a work we have no relation to.

Posted in Biblical Studies, SBL | Tagged John Thompson, Stephen Fowl, Theological Interpretation of Scripture | Leave a comment

Where to Set the Bar in Biblical Languages

Posted on November 18, 2012 by jacobcerone

Yesterday evening I sat in on the Applied Linguistics for Biblical Languages Seminar. The Q&A panel addressed where to set the bar for biblical languages. I was thrilled to know a conversation was taking place advocating higher standards. But what the panel means by this is reorienting our pedagogical approach towards teaching the biblical languages. They must be taught as a living languages.

I am not entirely sure how I felt throughout the session. To some degree, I felt like I was being strong armed. At one point, Daniel Streett, as seen in the picture above, said, “I find it amazing that I have to convince Greek professors about the value of learning Greek.”

I agree with Daniel, et al. The bar should be set higher. Expecting second and third year students to read only 3 chapters of a biblical text within one semester is not enough. The bar is too low.

At one point during my seminar in Hermeneutics this semester, I asked Dr. Köstenberger why we aren’t reading and being taught the Greek of the Apostolic Fathers, Josephus, Philo, and others. The response I received was, “Frankly, Jacob, students are lazy.”

I claim no exception to this rule. My Greek is pathetic considering the number of semesters I have taken. But is the solution learning to hear, speak, and compose Greek? Is it our goal to revive a dead language. I understand that being able to think in a language is instrumental in understanding it. But the language is dead. There are no remaining speakers of koine Greek. The conversation has stopped. Anything that modern day “speakers” of koine compose will, by definition, be artificial.

When asked what the ultimate goal of this pedagogical approach serves, I was expecting something like “Fluency in the language allows us the greater ability to distinguish between connotation and denotation, to better grasp the semantic domains of certain words, and to comprehended the particularities of langue versus parole.”

Instead, Daniel Streett responded by saying that, like any other language, the ultimate goal is language acquisition. But why? Is it our goal to be able to speak to one another in koine Greek? Surely not. Is it our goal to be able to write our on epistle to the Corinthians? I would hope not.

The desire fueling this movement is the need to conceptualize the language instead of treating it like a decoding project. Admirable though the approach may be, I don’t believe it gets us any closer to the language. I think that reading more biblical and non-biblical Greek texts will get us closer to a greater “fluency” of koine Greek.

The bar should be raised. Why are we not reading more Greek? Why are we not building vocabulary? Will we not be able to better understand the structure of koine Greek by forcing ourselves to read koine literature widely?

Posted in Hebrew, NT Greek | 5 Comments

A Manifesto for Theological Interpretation

Posted on November 17, 2012 by jacobcerone

Last night was the annual meeting of the Scripture and Hermeneutics Seminar. For those of you that are unfamiliar, this seminar is part of the Paideia Center and is responsible for works such as “Behind the Text,” “After Pentecost,” and “Out of Egypt.”

I had the privilege of listening to 12 brief presentations outlining various elements that should be a part of theological interpretations. Some of these topics address the recovery of historical criticism as a theological (not atheological) endeavor, theology in service of the ecclesia, and the telos of theological interpretation.

Here is Dr. Heath Thomas speaking on the Telos of Theological Interpretation:

Here is Craig Bartholomew speaking on Theological Interpretation for all Life:

It is important to forewarn those of you licking your chops that this endeavor is in its initial phases.

After the Seminar, we met for dinner. I was honored to speak with Knut Heim, the Vice-President of Trinity College in Bristol, Phillip, a recent PhD grad, and Ron, a PhD candidate at Trinity Divinity.

I must say that though these men (Heath Thomas, Craig Evans, Craig Bartholomew, Chris Wright, Paul House, and Scott Hafemann) are kings in their fields, I came away from that dinner feeling like a king. That isn’t because I am anything or anyone special. I have noticed at conferences that people won’t talk to you if you aren’t a professor or a PhD candidate. Oh, you’re a ThM student at SEBTS, let me find a way out of this conversation so that I can find someone that can stroke my ego.

These guys exhibited true humility. They listened, were attentive and inquisitive, and were willing to humbly offer advice. Thanks to all of you in the Scripture and Hermeneutics Seminar! I am already looking forward to next year.

Posted in Biblical Studies | 1 Comment

Some Fun With the Biblical Languages: Give Away Contest

Posted on November 15, 2012 by jacobcerone

If you have ever felt the need to translate pithy phrases into Biblical Greek or Hebrew, then you will understand this post. See how many you can translate. I dare you to not be hungry when you finish!

1) ζηθι מנ

2) βαβα βα βα βααα εγω ειμι αγαπησας αυτον

3) εστιν ΒΩ καιρος

4) φαγετε μαλλον ορνιν

5) εχετε αυτον ὁδον σου

6) ὁ δακτυλος ὁ επιλειχος ὁ καλος

7) ὑποοδον, φαγετε γλυκυς

8) συναγαγετε περι καλον λογον

9) ερχεσθε νειστεις, απερχεσθε μακαριος

Email me with your answers at jacobncerone@gmail.com and win a free copy of Dr. Black’s Using New Testament Greek in Ministry: A Practical Guide for Students and Pastors.

Some Ground Rules

1) Competition ends December 1st

2) Please do not post answers in the comments section.

3) You are free to post your own translations of other slogans in the comments section.

4) At the end of the competition I will post the answers.

5) If there are any ties, I will draw your name out of a hat…or maybe have you translate a section from Justin Martyr so I don’t have to do it…

I look forward to hearing from you!

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Justin Martyr: Laws Concerning Food

Posted on October 30, 2012 by jacobcerone

I believe that I finally picked a topic, or rather interpreter, for my upcoming term paper in “Pre-Reformation Interpretation of the Old Testament.” Justin Martyr. As many of you know, Justin was an apologist of the Early Church writing around the second century. Justin’s work Dialogue with Trypho is a fictional conversation that takes place between Trypho, a Jew, and Justin. I have only made it into the 20th chapter so far and have observed many things concerning his interpretive practice. For one, he sets the stage for all interpreters after him in defending the Messianic character of Jesus Christ from the Old Testament. Though there are other facets to his interpretive practice, I want to draw from a particular example I found in Chapter 20 of Dialogue with Trypho.

The Greek text reads:

Τῷ γὰρ Νῶε ὅτι συγκεχώρητο ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ, δικαίῳ ὄντι, πᾶν ἔμψυχον ἐσθίειν, πλὴν κρέας ἐν αἵματι, ὅπερ ἐστὶ νεκριμαῖον, διὰ Μωῦσέως ἀνιστορήθη ὑμῖν ἐν τῇ Βίβλῳ τῆς Γενέσεως.

My Translation:

For through Moses it was recorded for you in the book of Genesis that God permitted to Noah, who was a righteous man, to eat any animated thing, except meat in its blood, which is dead.

LXX of Genesis 9:3-4 reads:

και πᾶν ἐρπετόν, ὅ ἐστιν ζῶν. ὑμῖν ἔσται εἰς βρῶσιν ὡς λάχανα χόρτου δέδωκα ὑμῖν τὰ πάντα. πλὴν κρέας ἐν αἴματι ψυχῆς οὐ φάγεσθε

My Translation:

And every creeping thing, which is alive, it will be for you as food just like the vegetation, I have given to you all things. Except the meat in its blood of life, do not eat.

This particular passage stuck me as interesting because Justin regularly quotes at length from the Torah and Prophets. Why has he chosen only a phrase (four words) from Genesis? Also, notice that the LXX (also the MT) reads ἐρπετόν “creeping thing” instead of Justin’s συγκεχώρητο “animated thing.” This seems to be a strategic move on Justin’s part not to be attributed to simple paraphrasing. Finally, notice the fact that ψυχῆς “of life” has been dropped from the LXX. Why does the reference to Genesis 9:3-4 take this form?

Justin is in the middle of demonstrating that the laws of the Old Testament have been added as a means to punish the Jews. The Patriarchal history is treated as a pristine era in Justin’s mind. Abraham was justified before there was a mention of circumcision. The law was not given from Adam until Moses. Why was the law necessary all of a sudden? Justin notes that the law is delivered to Israel on the heels of her idolatry. Because they ate, drank, and rose up to play during the Golden Calf incident in Exodus, God has given the law as a means to keep Israel away from idolatry. This is not the way it was supposed to be. This is not how the Christian is to live.

After moving through the matters of circumcision and law, Justin now turns to Jewish dietary restrictions. He utilizes the Noah account as ammunition against his interlocutor, Trypho. If Justin can demonstrate that the faithful of God lived without the dietary restrictions before the law is added, then he has added to his overall argument that the law, in toto, is abrogated.

Yet, it would appear that Genesis 9:3-4 could backfire on Justin if he doesn’t tweak it a bit.

First, “Every creeping thing/reptile,” after all, is not the equivalent of “every animate thing.” Trypho could simply object on the grounds that this divine decree does not make all foods permissible.

The law denying consumption of meat with blood in it poses a second problem for Justin. Apparently as early as the 2nd century, the early church no longer abstained from a medium rare steak. Justin interprets this prohibition in light of the Leviticus 22:8, “He shall not eat what dies of itself or is torn by beasts, and so make himself unclean by it: I am the LORD.’” Coupled with this is the omission of the word ψυχῆς “of life.” If Justin’s interpretation that “meat with blood in it” refers to an animal that has died naturally, then he must remove the grounding for the prohibition in Genesis 9:4. Noah was not to eat of meat with its blood because the blood is the life of every creature. Genesis 9:5 says, “And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.”

Even with Justin’s rather fanciful manipulation of Genesis 9:3-4, it does not seem as if Justin has made his case. If he indeed references Leviticus 22:8 as a more appropriate interpretation of “except the meat in its blood,” then hasn’t he utilized what he seeks to prove obsolete, the Jewish law?

Though it is disheartening to see Justin play fast and loose with the text, it should serve as a warning to all of us who interpret Scripture. Let us not take the easy way out when trying to prove our points. Let us search the Scriptures and handle them rightly.

Posted in Old Testament Studies | Tagged Dietary Laws, Genesis, Justin Martyr | 5 Comments

Textual Criticism

Posted on October 24, 2012 by jacobcerone

I have a confession to make: I don’t understand how text critics stay sane. Don’t get me wrong! I have a great respect for Dr. Black and Dr. Robinson. I also believe that the work of the text critic is necessary. Establishing the text of the New Testament must be done first before we move on to the meaning of the text.

Nevertheless, I have spent the last two days (and by two days I mean 8+ hours a day) sitting at my computer. I have been dividing up all the manuscript witnesses provided by the Center for New Testament Textual Studies for all variants in Matthew 3 (except for spelling discrepancies).

After I finished arranging manuscripts according to their textual families and dating, I came to the realization that not everyone accepts Aland’s fivefold classification system (I Alexandrian, II Egyptian, III Eclectic, IV Western, V Byzantine). Metzger only has three categories (Alexandrian, Western, Byzantine). Black and Robinson hold to 3, possibly 4, categories (Alexandrian, Western, Byzantine, and ~Caesarean/Other important witnesses). Needless to say, I had to reorganize the Egyptian and Eclectic categories to go in the Alexandrian and Caesarean families respectively (with a few exceptions).

I thought that the worst was finally over. All that was left was addressing the variant in Matthew 3:12. It was a bit more complex so I decided to save it for the end. Since the notations in Aland and CNTTS were a bit confusing, I decided to look at the facsimiles of codex Vaticanus and Washingtonensis. Vaticanus was a breeze. Nothing better than the hand of a meticulous scribe with good orthography. Washingtonensis wouldn’t have been so bad if the program I was using hadn’t mislabeled the versifications for the page I was studying. It took me about an hour to realize that Matthew 3:11-4:3 was actually on the page labeled 3:4-11.

At the end of the day, I have learned a number of things.

Woe to the man who treats the text critical apparatus in his BHS or NA27 with low regard or disdain.
Woe to the man who believes that the resources he uses are impeccable and impeachable.
Woe to the man who assumes too much and must re-do his work because he accepted a theory that has long since been questioned.
Finally, blessed be the man who does the tedious and tiresome work of textual criticism. May he ever stay sane, and may the Lord bless him for his never ending toil.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Graduation Day!

Posted on October 17, 2012 by jacobcerone

Today was graduation day for my Hebrew Grammar I and Hebrew Grammar II class. Today marks the conclusion of a class that Nathaniel Cooley and I began one year ago. We started with around 7-8 students. We have ended with 2.

Within the class, we studied through the first 40 chapters of Ross’ Introducing Biblical Hebrew. If you think that two ladies within the local church making it through Ross without any external motivation is impressive, I haven’t told you that we also read In the Original Text It Says (a more hands on treatment of Carson’s Exegetical Fallacies), translated through the book of Jonah and are halfway through the first chapter of Ruth.

Even more impressive is the fact that they aren’t calling it quits. Do you think I have next Wednesday morning from 7:30-9:00AM to myself? Nope! We will be picking up with Mitchell’s vocabulary guide, Arnold and Choi’s A Guide to Biblical Hebrew Syntax, and we will continue translating through Ruth.

If you thought I was done bragging about these amazing students, I’m not. The fact that impresses me even more is that throughout our translations, neither has referenced biblical software like Logos, Accordance, or Bible Works. They haven’t used analytical resources that provide parsing helps. They have worked through the text with only one aid, A Reader’s Hebrew Bible. This source footnotes some of the more infrequently used words.

I mentioned the fact that they have persisted with me for a year without any external motivation. What, then, keeps them going? They are driven to understand the Word of God in the original languages. They want to see God’s Word with fresh eyes. Week after week they learn vocabulary, paradigms, and translate through exercises (both sight reading in class and as homework). Week after week they are frustrated with the nuances of the language, the ever changing vowels, the multiplication of Hebrew root forms, and the difficult task of learning the vocabulary. But coupled with that is the knowledge that reliance on God and discipline produces.

Kudos to you, Ingrid and Christine. I can only pray that I will be capable of matching your discipline and ardent pursuit of God!