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B-Greek: The Biblical Greek Forum View topic - Ephesians 2.8

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Ephesians 2.8
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Ephesians 2.8
by thomas.hagen August 14th, 2012, 4:55 pm I have a question concerning Ephesians 2.8: , THi GAR XARITI ESTE SESWSMENOI DIA PISTEWS KAI TOUTO OUK EC UMWN, QEOU TO DWRON for by grace have you been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;

I have seen many apparently scholarly studies which claim that TOUTO refers to PISTEWS and just as many studies which claim that TOUTO refers to salvation by grace. Is there anything in the Greek text which can resolve this debate? Thank you for any enlightenment you can give me on this. Thomas Hagen thomas.hagen Posts: 3 Joined: August 14th, 2012, 4:22 pm Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Barry Hofstetter August 15th, 2012, 1:13 am Just to muddy it further for you, Tom, I believe it refers to the entire previous clause, "saved by grace through faith." It's not unusual to use the neuter to refer to a previous clause. N.E. Barry Hofstetter Instructor of Latin Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy Barry Hofstetter Posts: 351 Joined: May 6th, 2011, 1:48 pm Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

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B-Greek: The Biblical Greek Forum View topic - Ephesians 2.8

by GlennDean August 15th, 2012, 12:21 pm I just noticed is in the gen-sg-fem (Case-Number-Gender), while is in the nom-sg-neuter, so the antecedant of can't be (since the pronoun must match its antecedant in Number-Gender). GlennDean Posts: 69 Joined: March 3rd, 2012, 11:06 pm Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Stirling Bartholomew August 15th, 2012, 2:01 pm GlennDean wrote:I just noticed is in the gen-sg-fem (Case-Number-Gender), while is in the nom-sg-neuter, so the antecedant of can't be (since the pronoun must match its antecedant in Number-Gender).

"Substantivized neuter singular pronouns, both demonstrative and relative may be used with relation to either feminine or masculine substantives." G. Cooper (Attic Greek Prose Syntax v. 2, #58.3.6.A. p. 936). Never the less, I agree with B. Hofstetter. Furthermore, the neuter singular pronoun is particularly well suited for reference to the entire "scenario" represented in Eph. 2:4-8. C. Stirling Bartholomew C. Stirling Bartholomew Stirling Bartholomew Posts: 127 Joined: August 9th, 2012, 4:19 pm Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Bob Nyberg August 15th, 2012, 4:16 pm Concerning Eph 2:8, Dan Wallace wrote: This is the most debated text in terms of the antecedent of the demonstrative pronoun, . The standard interpretations include: (1) grace as antecedent, (2) faith as antecedent, (3) the concept of a grace-by-faith salvation as antecedent, and (4) having an adverbial force with no antecedent (and especially). The issues here are complex and cannot be solved by grammar alone. Nevertheless, syntactical considerations do tend toward one of the latter two views. He explains the possible options in his book Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics,

http://books.google.com/books? id=XlqoTVsk2wcC&pg=PA334&lpg=PA334&dq=%22the+most+debated+text+in+terms+of+the+antecedent+of+the+demonstrative+pronoun%22+%22while+it+is+true+that+on+rare EPF8NA3KTo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=_QAsULWMIOGqyAGC2oCgCA&ved=0CEYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22the%20most%20debated%20text%20in%20terms%20of%20the%

Bob Bob Nyberg Posts: 26 Joined: May 31st, 2011, 10:06 pm Location: Missouri Website Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Louis L Sorenson August 15th, 2012, 11:06 pm = adverbial is an interesting consideration. I think it would take a lot of analysis though to pin this down, as the phrase occurs 24,639x in TLG-e. There should be an ample number of parallel examples to bolster an adverbial understanding of this phrase. Louis L Sorenson Posts: 546 Joined: May 5th, 2011, 9:21 pm Location: Burnsville, MN, USA
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Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Barry Hofstetter August 16th, 2012, 7:12 am For itself understood as referring to an entire clause, I think 1 Pet 2:19-20 provides two nice examples: 19 20 ; , . For used with adverbial force, it is an interesting suggestion, but as Louis suggests would take some work to prove it. My sense of the Greek (which is also to say the context) leads me to the whole clause interpretation. N.E. Barry Hofstetter Instructor of Latin Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy Barry Hofstetter Posts: 351 Joined: May 6th, 2011, 1:48 pm Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Stephen Carlson August 16th, 2012, 8:41 am Barry Hofstetter wrote:For used with adverbial force, it is an interesting suggestion, but as Louis suggests would take some work to prove it. My sense of the Greek (which is also to say the context) leads me to the whole clause interpretation.

I agree, but if the adverbial is viable, it should expand the exegetical options for what becomes now the implied topic for the fragmentary predicate . Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D. (Duke) Post-Doctoral Fellow, Faculty of Theology, Uppsala Stephen Carlson Posts: 1540 Joined: May 11th, 2011, 10:51 am Location: Uppsala University Website Top

Re: Ephesians 2.8

by Louis L Sorenson August 30th, 2012, 10:57 pm I've been thinking about the structure in Eph. 2.8 8 ,

It's been thrown out that this could be an adverbial construction. Concerning Eph 2:8, Dan Wallace wrote: This is the most debated text in terms of the antecedent of the demonstrative pronoun, . The standard interpretations include: (1) grace as antecedent, (2) faith as antecedent, (3) the concept of a grace-by-faith salvation as antecedent, and (4) having an adverbial force with no antecedent (and especially). The issues here are complex and cannot be solved by grammar alone. Nevertheless, syntactical considerations do tend toward one of the latter two views.

I wonder if it would not be better to classify as a discourse structure: restatement - reinforcement, rather than say it is 'adverbial'. I have not looked into Runge's discourse grammar to see where this would fit, but definitely seems to me to be a device used by a . Louis L Sorenson Posts: 546 Joined: May 5th, 2011, 9:21 pm Location: Burnsville, MN, USA

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