From: Steven Craig Miller (stevencraigmiller@home.com)
Date: Tue Jan 30 2001 - 08:42:58 EST
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To: Iver Larsen,
<< Positing a chiasm in Matt 7:6 does not violate Greek syntax. The third
person plural forms are the least specific in terms of personal deixis, and
they often function equivalent to a passive. (This is a claim of universal
linguistics, called declining specificity in personal pronouns.) This means
that one often has to rely in a significant way on the context and make
some guesses as to what may be the intended referent of a third person verb
form. >>
This appears to be more of a rationalization than an explanation. Why don't
you give us concrete examples where two 3rd person plural verbs connected
only with a KAI (and without any other subject indicators -- examples just
like we have at verse 6cd), which refer to two different subjects? Unless
you can come up with concrete examples to prove your case, your theorizing
doesn't have any real merit.
Furthermore, if one has to guess (as you say), why guess the "a b b a"
structure of a chiasmus? Why not guess the "a b a b" structure of
parallelism? Or better yet, why not guess that the subject of verse 6c and
the subject of verse 6d are the same subject? If it is all a matter of
guess work, how do you justify that one guess is better than another?
Positing a chiasm in Matt 7:6 does indeed violate normal Greek syntax,
since in normal Greek syntax two verbs joined only with a KAI and with no
other indication of a change of subject, normally refer to the SAME
subject. For you to assume that they refer to two different subjects is
indeed a violation of normal Greek syntax.
-Steven Craig Miller
Alton, Illinois (USA)
stevencraigmiller@home.com
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