Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

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jeidsath
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Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

Georg Luck convinced me with this. Westcott and Hort also have a long section on Acts 20:28 in their notes, and Hort, after dismissing the other normally suggested solutions, declares that it's quite possible that υἱοῦ dropped out very early in transmission.

Acts 20:28 W&H
προσέχετε ἑαυτοῖς καὶ παντὶ τῷ ποιμνίῳ, ἐν ᾧ ὑμᾶς τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον ἔθετο ἐπισκόπους, ποιμαίνειν τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ θεοῦ, ἣν περιεποιήσατο διὰ τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου
Georg Luck:
In his farewell speech to the elders of the congregation in Ephesus, Paul says: “So keep watch over yourselves and the whole flock which the Holy Spirit has placed in your care, so you are shepherds of the church of God which he has made through his own blood.” Can we really accept the readings αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου or ἰδίου αἵματος? The NJB very sensibly translates “the Church of God which he bought with the blood of his own Son,” adopting a conjecture by Knapp, without giving him credit. As Knapp recognized, υἱοῦ was omitted by mistake after ἰδίου by haplography, because of the similarity of the capital letters. In Rom. 8:32 we actually read τοῦ ἰδίου υἱοῦ. That God shed his own blood cannot possibly be the meaning of the Greek, because τοῦ ἰδίου is postponed, nor can God’s own blood” mean “God’s own son”, because “blood” is never used for “son” in the Book of Acts. On the other hand, the idea that God made the Church his own by the blood of Jesus is central to Paul’s thought. A rather desperate way out of the difficulty has been proposed by Metzger who supposes that ὁ ἰδίος could be a title for the Messiah, like ὁ ἀγαπητός. Along the same lines, J. Jervell takes ἰδίου as “of his own”, i. e. Christ which seems to do violence to Greek.
And from a footnote:
See on this and other controversial passages H. Riesenfeld, “Sind Konjekturen bei einer Übersetzung des Neuen Testaments notwendig?”, in: Text-Wort-Glaube, Kurt Aland gewidmet, ed. by M. Brecht (=Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte 50, 1989), 40-6. Riesenfeld, a theologian, and J. Palm, a hellenist, were commissioned by the Swedish government to translate the New Testament into Swedish. They decided to approach textual problems in a pragmatic fashion, by looking critically, as they say, at all conjectures found in editions and commentaries. They also focused on obscure passages, keeping in mind the possibility of textual corruption. In the end, they claim to have found only two passages, Col. 2:23 and Jude 22-3 which, in their opinion, were corrupt, no satisfactory conjectures being available. In these two instances, they chose a variant from the paradosis and proposed a translation which, in their own words, did not sound “totally nonsensical” – a modest goal, to be sure, though I have doubts about the validity of their method. In two passages, the one we are discussing now and in Rom. 4:11-2, they considered adopting a conjecture but felt that it was not absolutely necessary. In Acts 16:12 (see above) they believed that the conjecture was “highly probable”. In Rom.7:21, Riesenfeld proposed a conjecture of his own. Needless to say, these results give a completely misleading picture of the actual situation. To eliminate suggestions made by scholars like Scaliger, Grotius or Bentley and then surprise the world with a new one is not exactly an approach that deserves to be imitated.
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by Markos »

Georg Luck wrote:That God shed his own blood cannot possibly be the meaning of the Greek, because τοῦ ἰδίου is postponed...
What does Luck mean by "postponed?"
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

I'm not 100% sure. I would think that he's talking about it τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου versus the more natural τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος. Hort discusses that here:
Doubt is moreover thrown on both these interpretations by the remarkable form διὰ τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου (not, as in the Syrian text, διὰ τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος), which seems to imply some peculiar force lying in the word ἰδίου. On the supposition that the text is incorrupt, such a force would be given by the sense 'through the blood that was His own', i.e. as being His Son's....It is however true that this general sense,
if indicated, is not sufficiently expressed in the text as it stands. A suggestion often made, that τ. ἰδίου is equivalent to τ. ἰδίου υἱοῦ, cannot be justified by Greek usage. Since however the text of the Acts is apparently corrupt in several other places, it is by no means impossible that ΥΙΟΥ dropped out after ΤΟΥΙΔΙΟΥ at some very early transcription affecting all existing documents. Its insertion leaves the whole passage free from difficulty of any kind.
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by Markos »

ὦ χαῖρε, φίλε Ἰώηλ. καλῶς δ' ἄγοις τὴν ἑορτήν.
jeidsath wrote:I'm not 100% sure. I would think that he's talking about it τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου versus the more natural τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος.
The latter construction is of course more common, but the former occurs, even with this adjective, even within the same book.
Acts 1:25: λαβεῖν τὸν κλῆρον τῆς διακονίας ταύτης καὶ ἀποστολῆς, ἐξ ἧς παρέβη Ἰούδας, πορευθῆναι εἰς τὸν τόπον τὸν ἴδιον.
Note that e.g. Vambas smooths this out: εἰς τὸν τόπον αὑτοῦ.
Georg Luck wrote:...nor can God’s own blood” mean “God’s own son”, because “blood” is never used for “son” in the Book of Acts.
I've never understood this type of argument, but you hear it all the time applied to Greek. No one would ever think of applying it to their own language.

In the phrase "To be or not to be, "not to be" cannot mean "death" because Shakespeare never uses "not to be" in the sense of "death."

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

Well let's look at W&H's text instead of the Byzantine:

λαβεῖν τὸν τόπον τῆς διακονίας ταύτης καὶ ἀποστολῆς, ἀφ' ἧς παρέβη Ἰούδας πορευθῆναι εἰς τὸν τόπον τὸν ἴδιον.

So we have a contrast between the two τόποι. Also, look back to verse 20. This callout of τόπος is to justify Peter's quotation of ἡ ἔπαυλις αὐτοῦ ἔρημος καὶ μὴ ἔστω ὁ κατοικῶν ἐν αὐτῇ and to mark the application.

So I think that your example demonstrates what Hort is saying. The construction in 1:25 is there for emphasis to express the contrast. However, in 20:28 as received, there are two problems 1) it's theologically strange for Luke to say that God saved us with his blood, and 2) the emphasis is strange. We could construct solutions for why Paul would have felt necessary to emphasize God's particular blood (and not somebody else's), but we can also suppose that ΥΙΟΥ dropped out of the text early on.
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by Markos »

jeidsath wrote:Well let's look at W&H's text instead of the Byzantine:
Sure, we can do that here and in general. But the irony is that Hort feels the need to emend a text which only exists because he has established it from Egyptian variants. The majority text of Acts 20:28 has ἣν περιεποιήσατο διὰ τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος.

I will concede your point that, all things being equal, the "postponed" adjective may signal some sort of emphasis.
jeidsath wrote:We could construct solutions for why Paul would have felt necessary to emphasize God's particular blood (and not somebody else's), but we can also suppose that ΥΙΟΥ dropped out of the text early on.
Sure, we can do both.

Riplinger does not discuss Acts 20:28, but she could have.

Does God the Father have blood? Probably not. Does Jesus? Yes. Is Jesus God? Yes. Is Jesus God the Father? Sort of, yes.

There are many places in Acts and elsewhere in the NT where it is unclear if something is referring to God the Father or Jesus. I would place the non-Egyptian version of Act 20:28 in this category. These passages are one of the things that help establish what would become the doctrine of the Trinity. Hort's final version of Acts 20:28 undermines this.

Riplinger, of course, ascribes wicked motives to both the Alexandrian redaction and to Hort. I am agnostic as to the former, speculating that it is merely a shortened text preserved, at least partially, by memory. (If you try to produce some of the GNT from memory, I guarantee that you will produce a shorter text, with may of the same minor divergences that you see in Egyptian text.) But I recently read this:
Randall Buth wrote:Maurice Robinson, IIRC, thinks that the Alexandrian text type may have been an ancient scholarly edition to serve as the base for the Coptic translation(s).
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

But the irony is that Hort feels the need to emend a text which only exists because he has established it from Egyptian variants.
At least in Acts 20:28, W&H don't seem to have created anything new. The Byzantine text family has ιδιου αιματος. However, all of the Unicals except L, including Ψ (Mt. Athos) and E (early Byzantine-type) have του αιματος του ιδιου. Cyril of Alexandria quotes the verse as του αιματος του ιδιου. So the Byzantine variant is very lonely here.

I don't really think that it's fair to claim that Hort established an Egyptian text. In his introduction he says that the Byzantine text family has roots just as old as the other text families, and therefore needs to be taken seriously. On the other hand, Hort says that Byzantine manuscripts show the same progressive corruption over time that the other manuscript families displayed.

The Byzantine variant doesn't solve the problem that nowhere do the apostles talk about God's own blood, but often talk about the blood of his son.
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by C. S. Bartholomew »

Markos wrote:ὦ χαῖρε, φίλε Ἰώηλ. καλῶς δ' ἄγοις τὴν ἑορτήν.
jeidsath wrote:I'm not 100% sure. I would think that he's talking about it τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου versus the more natural τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος.
The latter construction is of course more common, but the former occurs, even with this adjective, even within the same book.
Acts 1:25: λαβεῖν τὸν κλῆρον τῆς διακονίας ταύτης καὶ ἀποστολῆς, ἐξ ἧς παρέβη Ἰούδας, πορευθῆναι εἰς τὸν τόπον τὸν ἴδιον.
Is there anything unnatural about an adjective in second attributive position? Referring to an adjective in second attributive position as "postponed" introduces confusion since that word used within an adjective seems to suggest hyperbaton.
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by C. S. Bartholomew »

jeidsath wrote:
Well let's look at W&H's text instead of the Byzantine:
In the current literature you might discover a subtle shift in the attitude toward the Byzantine Textform:
A Critical Examination of the Coherence-Based Genealogical Method in New Testament Textual Criticism, (New Testament Tools, Studies and Documents) is a book by J. Peter Gurry (Brill, 268pgs) released 2017-10-05.
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

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jeidsath wrote:The Byzantine variant doesn't solve the problem that nowhere do the apostles talk about God's own blood, but often talk about the blood of his son.
Would not this therefore make the Majority τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος the more difficult reading, and Hort's τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου υἱοῦ the least difficult reading of all? What an irony if Hort winds up restoring what itself is a secondary reading.
C. S. Bartholomew wrote:In the current literature you might discover a subtle shift in the attitude toward the Byzantine Textform:
In my own lifetime, in so many fields, I have again and again seen the consensus of the experts change, and be proven wrong, and change again and be proven wrong again. "Fake literature," to coin a phrase. Regardless, it has always made more sense to me to accept a text that has been received rather than established. What hath Alexandria to do with Jerusalem?

But your mileage may vary.

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

Regardless, it has always made more sense to me to accept a text that has been received rather than established. What hath Alexandria to do with Jerusalem?
So what text do you use?
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by Markos »

jeidsath wrote:
Regardless, it has always made more sense to me to accept a text that has been received rather than established. What hath Alexandria to do with Jerusalem?
So what text do you use?
The Patriarchal Text of 1904. Where this departs from the Trinitarian Bible Society's Textus Receptus, (it almost never does) I use Robinson/Pierpont to break the tie.

How about you?

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by jeidsath »

The 1904 text is prepared from several different manuscripts, and so is Robinson/Pierpont, I believe. Erasmus’ text is complicated, but also used multiple manuscripts, I believe, with many corrections coming in from the Latin and the Fathers. So it’s not immediately obvious to me what you mean by “received” versus “established” and what makes a text one or the other.

I’ve been using the Tyndale House for reading lately, because it doesn’t have apparatus markings interfering with the text. I’ve also got Nestle-Aland’s with Latin and with German facing texts that I use when I want to see a more detailed apparatus. W&H, which I have as a PDF, is my second favorite reading edition, and the second volume provides excellent scholarship and discussion. I have a 1904 with the Septuagint bound with it, but there are too many typos in my version (introduced mostly in digitization?).
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

UBS 5 for general reading, N-A 28 for text critical issues. I have R&P and a number of other texts as well that I occasionally use as reference. I also have the Greek-German N-A (24, I think?) which I originally got with hopes of improving my German, but my German remains hopelessly unimproved.
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Re: Acts 20:28 αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου

Post by ἑκηβόλος »

C. S. Bartholomew wrote:Is there anything unnatural about an adjective in second attributive position? Referring to an adjective in second attributive position as "postponed" introduces confusion since that word used within an adjective seems to suggest hyperbaton.
An adjective, no. This particular adjective, apparently so.
jeidsath wrote:o we have a contrast between the two τόποι. Also, look back to verse 20. This callout of τόπος is to justify Peter's quotation of ἡ ἔπαυλις αὐτοῦ ἔρημος καὶ μὴ ἔστω ὁ κατοικῶν ἐν αὐτῇ and to mark the application.

So I think that your example demonstrates what Hort is saying. The construction in 1:25 is there for emphasis to express the contrast. However, in 20:28 as received, there are two problems 1) it's theologically strange for Luke to say that God saved us with his blood, and 2) the emphasis is strange. We could construct solutions for why Paul would have felt necessary to emphasize God's particular blood (and not somebody else's), but we can also suppose that ΥΙΟΥ dropped out of the text early on.
I would express this more simply as, if it is ver clear from context, the noun could be omitted.

Probably not in the autograph, but a double example anyway:
Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, 5.3 wrote:Περὶ τοῦ προτέρου γένους. Περὶ τοῦ ἰδίου. Περὶ τοῦ μέλλοντος.
Just a single example in this original content too (but not with the same meaning of possesion ir belonging of course):
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1148a wrote:ἐκείνῳ γὰρ ὁ κοινὸς λόγος τοῦ ἰδίου μικρὸν διέφερεν, ἀλλ᾽ ὅμως ἕτερος ἦν.
Following this line of examples, Hort's statement that may have been referring to the question as to whether the τοῦ ἰδίου here could have the same meaning in and of itself as the τοῦ ἰδίου υἱοῦ in Romans 8:
A suggestion often made, that τ. ἰδίου is equivalent to τ. ἰδίου υἱοῦ, cannot be justified by Greek usage.
could be revisited in the light of this other Grek usage (context) to find if the context of this part of the speech were considered thematically close enough to justify an understood υἱοῦ. That rests on the whether there is enough contast and harmony between "the blood of all of you" and the blood "of his own (son)".


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