From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Sun May 21 2000 - 08:23:38 EDT
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--></style><title>Re: Present Participle and
Faith</title></head><body>
<div>I make a practice of leaving in my "current" BG mailbox
messages that haven't drawn a response from anyone and take note of
these when I archive threads that have come to a close. It's in the
course of that process this morning that I've just read this message
again and I am somewhat surprised that nobody has touched it.
Potentially it touches on a question about which I think there are
differences between different groups of believers and therefore it is
potentially a controversial question, but we have dealt with passages
in the GNT that bear on this same question. So I'm going to essay a
response to this question which has gone begging for more than a
week; I think it's interesting enough from a purely aspectual angle
that we may be able to discuss it without getting off into tangential
doctrinal questions that are not appropriate to B-Greek.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>At 4:28 PM +0000 5/9/00, B.J. Williamson wrote:</div>
<div>>In a footnote on page 621 of Dan Wallace's<br>
>Exegetical Syntax (1996), the following statements are noted<br>
>in relation to John 3:16:<br>
><br>
>"The aspectual force of the present O PISTEUWN seems to
be<br>
>in contrast with O PISTEUSAS... Thus, it seems that since<br>
>the aorist participle was a live option to describe<br>
>a "believer," it is unlikely that when the present was
used,<br>
>it was aspectually flat. The present was the tense of choice<br>
>most likely because the NT writers by and large saw continual<br>
>belief as a necessary condition of salvation."<br>
><br>
>He also notes that it is "not due to the present tense only,
but<br>
>to the use of the present participle of PISTEUW, especially in<br>
>soteriological contexts in the NT."<br>
><br>
>My question centers around Dan's use of "continual
belief"<br>
>as a "necessary condition" of salvation.<br>
><br>
>I assume that nobody would deny that the present participle<br>
>pictures the action in progress, but to state that this<br>
>"continual" aspect of the present participle becomes a
"necessary condition"<br>
>moves beyond the nature of verbal aspect.<br>
><br>
>In other words, equating the "continual" aspect with
a<br>
>"necessary condition" seems extreme to me.<br>
></div>
<div>>Any thoughts?</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>May I urge that any respondent endeavor to be careful here to
focus discussion on verbal aspect in the present and aorist
participles of PISTEUW and NOT upon the tangential and doctrinal
issue of the nature of efficacious PISTIS itself.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>The FIRST thought that comes to my mind is that IF (AND ONLY IF)
one grants the possibility of "backsliding," one would
hardly suppose that a person who believed at one time but thereafter
became apostate meets the requisite "qualifications" for
salvation. But of course one may (and probably WILL!) argue over the
question of what constitutes efficacious faith--in particular over
whether it is necessarily (a) cognitive acceptance of one or more
propositions or (b) being in a trust relationship with God through
Christ, or (c) some linkage of (a) and (b).</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>The language of John 3 does seem very carefully to use the
present participle to refer to a "believer": 3:15 PAS hO
PISTEUWN EN AUTWi, 3;16 PAS hO PISTEUWN EIS AUTON. 3:18 presents the
converse: hO MH PISTEUWN and interestingly explains it with a
relative clause containing the perfect tense of the relevant verb: hO
PISTEUWN EIS AUTON OU KRINETAI; hO DE MH PISTEUWN HDH KEKRITAI, hOTI
MH PEPISTEUKEN EIS TO ONOMA TOU MONOGENOUS hUIOU TOU QEOU. It strikes
me that the usage of PEPISTEUKEN here excludes a 'consummative' sense
of the perfect (emphasis upon completion) but points rather toward
the 'intensive' sense of the perfect ('<font color="#000000">used to
emphasize the<i> completed action</i> of a past action or a process
from which a present state emerges'
<http://www.xensei.com/users/samato/gree
></span>k/gtense.html>)</font>. It also seems to me that the usage
of articular present participles here (hO PISTEUWN and hO MH
PISTEUWN) most clearly when used with PAS (PAS hO PISTEUWN) have the
generalized force of of a condition: i.e. hO PISTEUWN EIS AUTON OU
KRINETAI = hOSTIS AN PISTEUHI EIS AUTON OU KRINETAI.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Now while it may be dangerous to draw conclusions beyond
Johannine usage and I won't do it, my own examination of GJn's usage
of PISTEUW in the aorist with Jesus as the object either of EIS +
acc. or EN + dat. indicates to me that John uses the aorist of
PISTEUW in the sense of "achieve faith"--to reach the state
indicated by the present tense and especially by the present
participle of PISTEUW. My AcCordance search discloses only 2
instances of the articular aorist active participle in GJn, and they
seem to me consistent with what I've just said:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab> </x-tab>Jn
7:39 TOUTO DE EIPEN PERI TOU PNEUMATOS hO EMELLON LAMBANEIN hOI
PISTEUSANTES EIS AUTON; OUPW GAR HN PNEUMA, hOTI IHSOUS OUDEPW
EDOXASQH.</div>
<div><x-tab> </x-tab>Jn
20:29 LEGEI<x-tab> </x-tab>AUTWi hO IHSOUS: hOTI hEWRAKAS ME
PEPISTEUKAS? MAKARIOI hOI MH IDONTES KAI PISTEUSANTES.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>It would appear to me then that, so far as John's usage is
concerned, Wallace is right on target in what he has to say about
linkage of the present tense of PISTEUW with salvation. It strikes
me, however, that there's another question raised/posed by B.J.
Williamson's query regarding Wallace's statement: does PISTEUW in
John's usage refer to an ongoing ACT of believing or to continuation
in a STATE of belief? It may well be that how one understands the
Greek usage of the present tense of this particular verb is the
source of the contention between those who admit the possibility of
'backsliding' and those who do not. If PISTEUEIN is a
continuous/continuing ACT requiring a continuous/continuing exertion
of the will of the believer to sustain the act, then it would seem
reasonable enough to suppose a point in time at which that exertion
of the will is halted and the one who DID believe believes NO LONGER.
IF, on the other hand, one supposes that PISTEUEIN is a
continuous/continuing STATE, one that itself is the resultative
consequence of a relationship gained or achieved by a one-time action
of PISTEUSAI or PEPISTEUKENAI, then it's harder to speak of that
state coming to cessation. This strikes me as consistent with what
Bultmann once referred to as GJn's consistent
"determinism." Just as TEQNHKEN means "is dead"
so PEPISTEUKEN means "is in a state of efficacious
belief"--which state may and is more common expressed by John's
use of the articular present participle: hO PISTEUWN EIS/EN
EME/EMOI.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>BUT: if we suppose some degree of consistency between GJn and
the Letters of John, it would appear that PISTIS is more than a
verbal acknowledgement, or that a verbal assertion of PISTIS can be a
YEUDOS--or that's the meaning I derive from 1 John 4:20, which
doesn't use the word PISTIS but nevertheless seems to me to imply it:
EAN TIS EIPHi hOTI AGAPW TON QEON KAI TON ADELFON AUTOU MISHi,
YEUSTHS ESTIN; hO GAR MH AGAPWN TON ADELFON AUTOU hON hEWRAKEN, TON
QEON hON OUC hEWRAKEN OU DUNATAI AGAPAN. It may well seem to some
that I am pushing this farther than the text actually permits, but it
does seem--to me at least--than John or the Johannine author shows
clearly that even as an ongoing state, faith has CONSEQUENCES whereby
its reality may be discerned.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div> </div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>-- <br>
<br>
Carl W. Conrad<br>
Department of Classics, Washington University<br>
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243<br>
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad@ioa.com<br>
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/>
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