Download Prepositions and Theology in the Greek New Testament

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Prepositions and Theology in the Greek New Testament
Copyright © 2012 by Murray J. Harris
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Harris, Murray J.
Prepositions and theology in the Greek New Testament / Murray J. Harris.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 17–23) and indexes.
ISBN 978-0-310-49392-1 (hardcover)
1. Greek language, Biblical — Prepositions. 2. Bible. N.T. — Language, style. I. Title.
PA849.H37 2011
487'.4 — dc23
2011046973
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Greek New Testament text or the Septuagint.
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Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Select Bibliography and Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
The Phases of the Greek Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Prepositions and Adverbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Prepositions and Cases. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
The Basic Meaning of Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Principles of Choice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Exegeting Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2. Distinctive Features of Prepositional Usage in
New Testament Greek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
A. Characteristics in Keeping with the General
Tendencies of Hellenistic Greek (in Comparison
with Classical Greek) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
B. Possible Semitic Influence on New Testament
Prepositional Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3. Dangers to Be Avoided in Any Examination of
New Testament Prepositional Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
A. Insistence on Classical Greek Distinctions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
B. Failure to Make Allowance for a Writer’s
Stylistic Variation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
C. Disregard of Probable Distinctions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
D. Denial of Double Entendre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
E. Neglect of the Possible Significance of Items
with Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
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4.
and
A.
B.
C.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5.
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
6.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Basic Idea and New Testament Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Equivalence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Exchange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Substitution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Important New Testament Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
A. Relation of
to
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
B.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
C. Ellipses with (Pregnant)
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
D.
in Paul’s Epistolary Salutations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
E. Other Notable Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
F.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
7.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
A. Origin and Basic Idea . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
B. Notable Instances of Main Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
C.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
8.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
A. Origin and New Testament Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
B. Its Relation to
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
C. Its Relation to . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
D. Telic
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
E. Consecutive /Ecbatic
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
F. Causal ? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
G. Significant Phrases Using . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
H. Significant Successive Instances of
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
I. Ambiguity of Meaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
J.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
9.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
A. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
B. Basic Signification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
C. Range of Figurative Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
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D. Important Constructions Using
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
E. Other Significant Instances of
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
F.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
10.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
A. Extended New Testament Use and Ultimate
Disappearance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
B. Versatility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
C. Encroachment on Other Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
D. Main Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
E. Key Phrases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
F.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
11.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
12.
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
13.
Basic Meaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Versatility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Important Constructions Using
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Other Notable Uses of
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Basic Meaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Phrases Involving
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Denoting Correspondence or Conformity . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Denoting Opposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Distributive
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Some Ambiguous Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
A. Original Meaning and New Testament Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
B.
with Accusative (“after”) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
C.
with Genitive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
D.
Denoting “Presence With” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
E.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
14.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
A. Basic Sense. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
B. Transferred Meanings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
C.
.....................................
D.
and Christology in the Fourth Gospel . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
E.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
0310493927 preposition and theology in NT greek.indd 9
171
171
172
173
176
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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
15.
A. Basic and Derived Meanings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
B.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
C.
in Compounds. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
16.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
A. New Testament Use and Basic Meaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
B. Notable Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
C.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
17.
A. New Testament Use and Basic Meaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
B. Notable Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
C.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
18.
A. Original Meaning and New Testament Incidence . . . . . . . . . . 199
B. Two Basic Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
C. Relation to
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
D.
and Equivalents in Paul . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
E.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
19.
A. Original Meaning and New Testament Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
B.
with the Accusative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
C.
with the Genitive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
D.
and
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
E.
meaning “in the place of” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
F.
as Expressing Both Representation/Advantage
and Substitution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
G.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
20.
A. Original Meaning and New Testament Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
B.
with the Accusative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
C.
with the Genitive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
D.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
E.
and Other Prepositions Expressing Agency . . . . . . . . . . . 221
F.
in Compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
21. Prepositions with
A.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
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B.
C.
D.
E.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
22. Prepositions with
and
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
A. Nonprepositional Constructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
B. Prepositional Constructions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
C. Concluding Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
23. “Improper” Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
A. Nomenclature and Classification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
B. “Improper” Prepositions in Hellenistic Greek . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
C. An Annotated Alphabetical List of All 42 New Testament
“Improper” Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
24. Notable Uses of Selected “Improper” Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
Matthew 10:29 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
1 Corinthians 6:18 and 2 Corinthians 12:2 . . . . . . . . 255
John 1:15 (cf. 1:30). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
Luke 17:21 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
Matthew 1:25 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Hebrews 9:28 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
Index of Biblical References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Index of Greek Words and Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
Index of Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
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Chapter 1
Introduction
A. The Phases of the Greek Language
The following stages may be identified:
1. Ancient Greek, a category that here includes both pre-Classical (especially Homer) and Classical Greek.
2. Classical Greek, c. 450 BC – c. 330 BC, chiefly the Attic form.
3. Hellenistic /Koine Greek, c. 330 BC – AD 330,
(“the
common language”), in its literary and vernacular forms, is marked
by a virtual absence of dialectal forms except for local differences
in pronunciation, and what Bortone (239 n.3) calls “slight regional
variations.”1 The six main sources for our knowledge of Hellenistic
Greek are: literary texts by writers such as Polybius and Epictetus; the
Septuagint; the New Testament and other early Christian literature;
the Ptolemaic papyri; the inscriptions; and the observations of grammarians such as Moeris and Phrynichus. The expression “Biblical
Greek” is a convenient and traditional way of referring to the Greek of
the LXX and the NT, without suggesting it forms a defined dialect of
Hellenistic /Koine Greek.
4. Medieval Greek /Byzantine Greek, AD 330 (the removal of the seat of
government from Rome to Constantinople) – 1453 (the conquest of
Constantinople by the Turks).
5. Modern Greek, AD 1453 – the present; but specifically, in the present
work, the Greek written or spoken at the present day, “contemporary standard Greek” (Bortone 238 n.1), in which two strands are interwoven — a
1. Recognizing that Koine Greek was not a static entity and the probability that changes
in usage occurred during the 900 or so years (on his view) of Koine Greek, J. A. L. Lee
proposes a division of Koine Greek into Early (III – I BC), Middle (I – III AD) and Late
(IV – VI AD), “
” in Voces Biblicae: Septuagint Greek and Its Significance
for the New Testament, ed. J. Joosten and P. J. Tomson (Leuven: Peeters, 2007), 113 n.31.
0310493927 preposition and theology in NT greek.indd 25
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t *OUSPEVDUJPO
popular, vernacular strand (Demotic) and an archaizing or Atticizing
“purist” strand (Katharevousa).
The five stages isolated by Caragounis (in 2004) (XIII; and for more detail
XX, 1 – 63) are (after the Mycenaean or Linear B stage [15th – 12th century BC]):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Archaic or Epic Greek (800 – 500 BC)
The Classical (Attic) Period (500 – 300 BC)
Post-classical Greek (c. 300 BC – AD 600)
Byzantine-Mediaeval Greek (AD 600 – 1500)
The Neohellenic Period (AD 1500 – 2000)
“Neohellenic at present (i.e., the language spoken and written today) is very
broad, since it encompasses (simple) Katharevousa, moderate Demoticism and
extreme Demoticism” (Caragounis 56 – 57). “A more cultivated Demotic is in
effect a simple Katharevousa, and conversely, a simple Katharevousa, is a more
cultivated Demotic” (58).
At an earlier time (1897) Jannaris (xv, xxii) delineated five periods:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Attic (500 – 300 BC)
Hellenistic (300 – 150 BC)
Greco-Roman (150 BC – 300 AD)
Transitional (300 – 600 AD)
Neohellenic (600 – 1900 AD)
t #Z[BOUJOFo"%
t .FEJBFWBMo"%
t .PEFSOo"%
t 3FTUPSBUJWF"%oQSFTFOU
However we divide up the stages of the Greek language, all agree “that greater
changes took place during the 600 years separating Polybios from Homeros than
during the 2,100 years between Polybios and our time” (Caragounis 68). This
shows that “in the development of Greek time-length and change do not go hand
in hand: contrary to what might be expected, greater changes may take place
in a briefer period, while a more protracted period may be attended by slower
change” (Caragounis 89).
B. Terminology
1. “Preposition”
The term “preposition” ultimately comes from
, “a placing before,
a fore-placement” (a term used by the Greek grammarian Dionysius Thrax),
via the Latin prae-positio, also meaning “a placing before.” In Greek grammar
it denotes an indeclinable word that is placed before a substantive or pronoun
or prefixed to a verb. But originally “prepositions” followed the substantive (as
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*OUSPEVDUJPO t still done in the NT with
and
) and therefore were “postpositions”!
Etymology apart, a preposition is basically a word that denotes a relationship
between other words — hence the German term for preposition, Verhältniswort,
“word of relationship.” In each Greek preposition, it seems, there is an inherent,
foundational meaning that is further defined by a particular context.2
2. “Proper” and “Improper” Prepositions
Those prepositions (such as ) that can also serve as prefixes in compound words
have been called “proper” prepositions (17 in the NT), and prepositions (such as
) that cannot be used this way have been called “improper” prepositions
(42 in the NT). This classification is unfortunate, for most “improper” prepositions are equally “pre-positions” and they are functionally equivalent to “proper”
prepositions. Moreover it seems arbitrary to base a classification on an external
relation, that is, a word’s ability to be used as a prefix to another word. Although
“improper” prepositions are in no sense improper with regard to the Greek language, it has become customary (see, e.g., Smyth §§1647, 1699 – 702) to use
this convenient grammatical classification, no doubt partly because “improper”
prepositions usually “govern” a single case — the genitive. Robertson, however,
also uses the expression “adverbial prepositions” or “prepositional adverbs” (554,
557, 636 – 37) to describe “improper” prepositions. See further ch. 23.
C. Prepositions and Adverbs
In the parent Indo-European language, cases probably stood alone, but later
some adverbs came to be used as prepositions. Originally prepositions were locatival adverbs (Bortone xv, 140; cf. Robertson 553 – 54; 636 – 37); indeed, in
Homer words like
(“round about”) and
(“on both sides”) are still used
as adverbs. Also at the outset, prepositions were “post-positive” adverbs; that is,
they were placed after the word they qualified, a usage reflected in
,
“on account of what” = “why” (Ac 19:32; cf. Lk 4:18). So the term “preposition”
reflects a later development when these adverbs preceded the word they qualified.
Certainly, no precise distinction can be drawn between adverbs and prepositions.
Words like
and
are used either as adverbs or as prepositions; and in
Hellenistic Greek (including both the NT and the papyri) a preposition and an
adverb are often combined (e.g.,
and many “improper” prepositions
such as
[Mayser 538 – 42]), as also in Modern Greek (Thumb §158).
2. “Most linguists appear to endorse a conception of prepositional meaning as a combination
of an inherent meaning with a specification supplied by the context; in the terminology
diffused by [R.] Jakobson [“Beitrag zur allgemeinen Kasuslehre: Gesamtbedeutungen der
russischen Kasus,” Travaux du cercle linguistique de Prague 6 (1936): 240 – 88]: different
Sonderbedeutungen in each particular context, but related through an overall Gesamtbedeutung in abstract, or an underlying Grundbedeutung at the origin” (Bortone 42).
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t *OUSPEVDUJPO
D. Prepositions and Cases
“Both in time and at first in order” case came before prepositions (Robertson 567). From the point of view of historical development, prepositions did
not “govern” the case of a noun but rather helped to define more precisely the
distinctions indicated by the case forms or were added to recapture original
meanings; the accusative basically denoted direction (“Whither?”); the genitive, separation (“Whence?”); and the dative, location (“Where?”). That is, cases
found in prepositions a convenient means of sharpening their significance. But,
in ever-increasing measure, the case ending itself came to be divested of special significance because inflection expressed such diversified relations, and the
accompanying preposition, with its fixed case form, assumed part of the meaning of the case and potentially added new meanings.3
So it is somewhat artificial to analyze the case of a noun or pronoun in Classical or Hellenistic Greek apart from the “meaning” of the adjoining preposition; the writers themselves probably regarded prepositions as “governing” or
determining the case of the noun or pronoun. Originally, then, it was the case
that showed the meaning of the preposition, but ultimately the preposition was
regarded as giving a particular meaning to the case. To express the point another
way, at the outset cases “governed” prepositions, but in the end prepositions
were thought to “govern” cases in the sense of determining the case of a noun or
pronoun that would produce a specific meaning.
Since a plain case is often capable of various senses, an added preposition or
prepositional phrase can clarify and reinforce the intended meaning or actually
remove ambiguity. For example, a phrase such as
(2Co
5:14) could mean “the love shown by Christ” (subjective genitive) or “love for
Christ” (objective genitive), but
would express the
former meaning unequivocally.
E. The Basic Meaning of Prepositions
In his comprehensive and authoritative treatment of Greek Prepositions from
Antiquity to the Present (2010), P. Bortone has successfully defended his central
thesis that “the history of Greek prepositions, if analysed in its entirety, is largely
congruent with the ‘localistic hypothesis’ that concrete spatial meanings are the
earliest ones, and entirely congruent with the ‘unidirectionality hypothesis’ that
spatial meanings evolve into non-spatial ones but not vice-versa” (xii; cf. 52,
189, 302 – 3). “Spatial and non-spatial meanings seem to appear in a sequence”
(170) so that “new [prepositional] items attest that spatial senses were the first
3. Philologists suggest that the endings of prepositions may originally have been case inflections, e.g.,
, ,
,
and
, old locatives, and
,
,
,
and
, old instrumentals (Bortone 141 n.57, citing earlier studies; cf. 96 – 97).
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*OUSPEVDUJPO t Diagram of the Spatial Meanings of the
Seventeen New Testament “Proper” Prepositions
+G
+D
with
+A
around
+G
in front of
+G
opposite
+A
above
+D
beside
+G
upon
+D
through
+A
into
in
+A
towards
+G
out of
+G
away from
+G
down
+A
up
+A
under
In this diagram A, D, and G indicate the case after the preposition that gives the spatial
meaning indicated.
to appear, while the old items show that non-spatial senses were the last to be
shed” (xvi), and “once prepositions become exclusively abstract in meaning, they
never (re)acquire spatial meanings” (168). In stage 1 a preposition has only spatial meanings, in stage 2 both spatial and nonspatial senses, and in stage 3 only
nonspatial meanings (see the charts in Bortone 168 and 283). On the history of
the “localistic hypothesis,” see Bortone 47 – 53.
Many prepositions can denote three relations (local /spatial, temporal, figurative /metaphorical /abstract), which apparently developed in that order but, it
seems, the primary representation is always local:4
4. This primary local sense in usage was not necessarily the original local sense; e.g.,
may originally have meant “near,” and
“between.” See the introductory remarks for
each preposition.
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t *OUSPEVDUJPO
1. motion to:
(into),
(to[wards])
2. motion from:
(up),
(away from),
(down)
3. rest:
(opposite), (in),
(upon),
(with),
(beside),
(around),
(through),
(out of),
(above),
(under),
(in front of),
(with)
While the basic sense (the “root meaning”) of a preposition is sometimes
traceable when it is prefixed to another word, prepositions often gain additional
meanings when they are prefixed. Bortone illustrates this vividly by the versatile
meanings of
(basically meaning “up” as a preposition) when it is used in
Classical Greek as a prefix (120).
: “gulp down”
: “bore through”
: “shrink back”
: “beget anew”
: “have fever recurrently”
: “begin to play”
: “un-cover”
: “paint completely”
: “examine closely”
: “teach otherwise”
Also, it is not always possible to trace a basic sense when prepositions are used
figuratively. With regard to the main figurative relations, the prepositions may
be grouped as follows (reflecting principal usage):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
origin:
, ,
cause or occasion: ,
, ,
purpose or object: ,
,
,
result: ,
association or identification:
,
relation:
agency:
, sometimes
, ,
instrumentality or means: , ,
correspondence:
,
opposition:
,
,
,
,
, or
F. Principles of Choice
With over 10,000 NT uses of the 17 “proper” prepositions — not to speak of
occurrences of the 42 “improper” prepositions — there is clearly need for some
limiting criteria to determine which uses seem worthy of special examination
after the introductory observations about each preposition.
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