ON THE GREEK ARTICLE

^[p. 30] ON THE GREEK ARTICLE

The doctrine which, for nearly thirty years, has satisfied my own mind on the subject of the use of the Greek article is so simple, and at the same time (as being merely the intelligent application of a universally well-known principle of Greek grammar) so readily appreciable, that I have been surprised no one has stated and developed it. Nothing but my own habits, the conviction of how little I could pretend to critical scholarship, and the pressure of other service, has hindered my giving it publicity. But as it is a material help to the study of scripture, I venture to do so.⁺

The rule is simply this, illustrated in the known form of a proposition in Greek, That whenever a word⁺⁺ presents the object about which the mind is occupied, as objectively present to it, the article is used; whenever a word is merely characteristic, it is not.

In most simple cases this will be self-evident. It will confirm also many subordinate rules given in treatises on the subject; as, for example, those relating to abstract nouns, previous reference, and the like. In some cases it will leave a choice of using or not using the article, so far as the sense is concerned, and merely affect vigour of style: in some it will require the power of abstraction, a power absolutely demanded for the critical study of the Greek Testament. But it will explain all, and give the special force of a vast number otherwise left uncertain. This last reason, and the more perfect understanding of scripture connected with it, is what leads me thus to give it publicity.

The metaphysical reasons may be subordinately interesting, and confirm the rule. It may cause the article to retain its name of “definite,” though I should perhaps prefer “objective.” It may explain its early Homeric pronominal use. It may shew, that in translating Greek into English, “a,” or “the,” or neither,⁺⁺⁺ may be required: for that depends on the genius of English; our enquiry, on the genius of Greek. Our great point will be the truth of the fact.

⁺The rule itself I did state, I find, some years ago in the “Christian Witness,” but entered into no general development of it.

⁺⁺It has been suggested, that “combination of words” should be added. As indebted to the suggestion of another, I add it in a note.

⁺⁺⁺As in the case of an abstract word, which in Greek has the article, in English not: for example, oJ novmo”, law.

If I say oJ a[nqrwpov” ejsti zwo;n logikovn, the object before my mind to be described is oJ a[nqrwpo”. Zwo;n logikovn is the description — that which characterizes, in an explanatory way, the object about which I am occupied: it is not an object, but the character given to an object. The object is a[nqrwpo”. It may be the archetypal idea of the race (that is, an ideal object), or an actual individual previously spoken of; but it is the object before my mind to be spoken of⁺; oJ designates it; a[nqrwpo” names the thing designated. The anarthrous word describes, or attaches a descriptive idea to, the designated object. Hence, though the usage was subsequently lost, we can easily conceive that where some one had been named, it stood alone as a pronoun, answering to “he”; and in many phrases is rightly rendered “this,” or “that,” when in English the reference is specific, though equally well in general “the.”

Hence, too, the well-known usage in reciprocal propositions, that both nouns have it. That is, they are co-extensively predicable one of the other; or, rather, they both name or designate one identical object. This will only be the case as to the terms themselves, when the two words stand alone. When one is limited by the annexation of a governed noun or otherwise, it will only be true, of course, within that limit; that is, of the terms so modified. Thus in hJ aJmartiva ejsti;n hJ ajnomiva the terms are reciprocal, because both are taken in the abstract totality of the things in their nature. But hJ zwh; h\n to; fwsee footnote” twsee footnoten ajnqrwvpwn necessarily limits the reciprocity to the historical facts by the verb, and to a certain sphere of fact by the genitive following to; fwsee footnote”. That is, the article, as presenting an object, presents the whole thing named. If it be abstract, it is the whole thing in its nature, as hJ aJmartiva, hJ ajnomiva; and in this case the terms are properly reciprocal. If not, it affirms it as a fact within the limits given in the sentence. It requires some close attention of mind to see that limited propositions are reciprocal; but they are really so. In practice and in translations it is little attended to. The mind generally makes an ordinary proposition of it, and has all that is really important; but it would not have become me to pass over the case, as explaining the use of the article. The doctrine that an article to each noun makes the proposition reciprocal is one universally admitted; so that it does not affect my idea of the article. It was the limited case which had to be explained.

⁺Hence, when the article is used, it always marks the totality of the subject named, because it is a definite entire object before my mind and of course complete in itself. This is sometimes of little, sometimes of great, moment, but always true. The word to which the article is attached is universal; that is, an ideal abstract, or individual, that is, a particular case of the term, and to the exclusion there of others. It cannot have the sense of some. A word without the article may be numerically one, as is evident, if in the singular; but it is not any particular one, but characteristic.

^[p. 32] And now to open a little more the metaphysical order in the mind. The mind is ignorant, that is, has to receive, and be directed to, an object whose existence is assumed or recognized; it has to be informed about that object. JO turns its attention to an object (designates it, as an intellectual finger-post), supposed, I suspect, in all cases to be before the mind, named or unnamed; and, next, what accompanies oJ gives the object its name, as a[nqrwpo”. The predicate informs the mind about the object. Now in a reciprocal proposition both are names attached to the same object. Hence both are objective, and both descriptive. JH ajnomiva ejsti;n hJ aJmartiva. jAnomiva, lawlessness, is the object before my mind — that is, sin. So also sin is ajnomiva. They are different titles of the same object. But zwo;n logikovn is not an object at all. It is a descriptive idea, to enlarge so far my idea of my object, a[nqrwpo”. It may be applied perhaps to other objects.

Hence too the effort of the ancient logicians to define by the genus and essential difference; because one gave the general race or character of being, and the other that which distinguished the object from all other classes, and thereby made it one to itself. It was really classification, and so far well, but no more, Locke’s attempt to give, instead of that, all the qualities, informed more but was not a remedy: first, because many of those qualities were common, and not distinctive; secondly, because some might be individual. Hence the various efforts at classification in different branches of natural history by collections of distinctive marks sufficiently generalized.