From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Fri Aug 25 1995 - 20:30:40 EDT
At 3:16 PM 8/25/95, Alan M Feuerbacher wrote:
>Carlton Winbery said,
>
>>The fact that it is in the subjunctive gives a note of contingency, but I
>>think that this is because it is in a question where the exact time is in
>>dispute or unknown. I think the best translation in Mark 13:4 in the
>>subjunctive and with the infinitive is, "what is the sign when all these
>>things will happen."
>
>To me, that's a very fuzzy statement. Do you think that the purpose was
>to be fuzzy?
>
>>In verse 4 of Mark both instances of TAUTA seem to
>>refer to the same events, what Jesus has just predicted. Its amazing what
>>the writer of Matthew has done with that question!
>
>Would you care to expand on that?
Perhaps I can take Carlton off the hook and impale myself, if so it must
needs be (hoist on his own petard!).
(1) In the first place, let me say a little about MELLHi, the subjunctive
of MELLEI found in 13:4. Carlton was not trying to be cute or suggest
vagueness in offering "fixing to" as an equivalent of the verb here. The
fact is that from a classical Greek sense of MELLW as "intend" (closely
related to a common expression MELEI (single lambda) MOI TAUTA
PRATTEIN--which would be translated with pedantic literalness as "there is
a concern to me to do these things"), there has arisen already in the
classical period a common usage of MELLW with a future infinitive as a
practical equivalent to the future indicative:
MELLW TAUTA PRAXEIN = PRAXW TAUTA
The English future appears to have arisen in a very similar manner from the
use of SHALL as an auxiliary verb (although now we have come to use WILL in
every person and number).
To get back to the point, by the NT period, MELLEI, MELLOUSI(N) are used
quite regularly as auxiliaries with a present infinitive to form a
periphrastic future tense. There is thus no difference (I challenge anyone
to show me a difference) between hOTAN MELLHI TAUTA SUNTELEISQAI PANTA and
hOTAN TAUTA SUNTELHTAI PANTA or,to take it out of the subjunctive, between
TAUTA MELLEI SUNTELEISQAI PANTA and TAUTA SUNTELEQHSETAI PANTA.
(2) I don't quite agree with Carlton about the two instances of TAUTA in
Mark 13:4. Although the syntax of the Greek certainly permits the
interpretation that the TAUTA of POTE TAUTA ESTAI and the TAUTA of hOTAN
MELLHi TAUTA SUNTELEISQAI PANTA both refer to the same event(s), I
personally believe that in Mark's text the first TAUTA and the first
question refer more strictly to the time when the temple will be destroyed
as Jesus has predicted in 13:2, immediately upon his exit from the temple
with the disciples and prior to their ascent onto the Mt of Olives--and
that the second TAUTA and the second clause, which is in the subjunctive
because it depends upon an elliptical question which I would fill out thus:
TI (ESTAI) TO SHMEION ... There are, it seems to me, two distinct
questions: the first is when the destruction of the temple is to take
place; the second regards the tell-tale sign that the eschatological drama
is coming to its conclusion.
Now I don't want to be dogmatic here, but I side with those interpreters of
Mark's gospel who understand it as urgently apocalyptic, as datable to some
time very close to the actual end of the Jewish War in the destruction of
Jerusalem and the Temple, and as counseling the church of the evangelist's
community to the mission and mode of discipleship confronting it in the
short interim between the destruction of Jerusalem and temple and the
Parousia. Reading the gospel this way, I think that the two questions thus
concern, (1) the downfall of the temple, in accordance with the prophecy of
Jesus just uttered, and (2) the eschatological time-table or "sign(s)" of
the Parousia. That's why I think that PANTA is added in the second
question; the destruction of the temple may be included in the larger
sequence of the TAUTA referred to in the second question. Putting it
another way, I think I see the disciples' question as one question with a
follow-up: (1) when will that be? and (2) how are we to know when all that
is going to come to fulfilment?
(3) Compare Mt 24:3, EIPE hHMIN, POTE TAUTA ESTAI KAI TI TO SHMEION THS SHS
PAROUSIAS KAI SUNTELEIAS TOU AIWNOS. Here again let me preface by saying
that I side with those who believe that Matthew writes later than Mark and
that he has redacted Mark's text. I think that Matthew has understood quite
well what Mark meant in his somewhat less lucid formulation, and that he
has sharpened the sense of what Mark wrote in a way that suggests that
perhaps the interval between the destruction of the temple and the time of
the Parousia is not so short as Mark seems (to me, at least) to be
suggesting. Matthew also, as can be readily seen, writes better Greek by
putting the hOTAN + subjunctive clause into a noun phrase using the same
verbal root of SUNTELEW but pointing unmistakably to the final close of
this world-age. Matthew also, it may be noted, avoids that "pesky"
auxiliary verb MELLEI, about which this whole discussion started.
Now for some reason or other, the last time that Carlton and I were in
accord (more or less) on a subject, that being the commendability of the
Macintosh) we were quickly chastised as "Macintosh fanatics" (albeit with a
<g>). I hope we may escape the more searing flames this time, but the chips
will have to fall as they may. What was sought in the first place was "some
scholarly opinion" about the use of MELLHi. It's time for someone else to
declare an opinion.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO, USA 63130
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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