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Greek Lessons
- The Hour Had Not Yet Come: Divine Timing and Aorist Action in John 7:30
- Because of This Word: Perfect Tense and Power at a Distance
- The Greatest and the Least: Superlative Contrast and Kingdom Inversion in Luke 7:28
- Who Made You Judge? Participle and Aorist in the Voice of Rejection
- “To Be Thus Is Good”: Verbal Infinitives and Temporal Crisis in 1 Corinthians 7:26
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Category
Tag Archives: τις
The Indefinite Article In Greek
The Latin had no article, as the Greek has no indefinite article. Not even in the modern Greek has the indefinite article of the Teutonic and Roman tounges developed, though occasionally εις or τις is used with little more force than the English a (an). Even in the New Testament we see traces of this use of εις in Mat 8:19 where εις γραμματευς is equivalent to “a” in English
Matthew 8:19 και προσελθων εις γραμματευς ειπεν αυτω διδασκαλε ακολουθησω σοι οπου εαν απερχη
and a certain scribe having come, said to him, `Teacher, I will follow thee wherever thou mayest go
In fact, the English one, Scotch ane, French un, German ein is simply the cardinal “one” adapted to this very usage.… Learn Koine Greek
Use of the Interrogative Pronoun τις
The pronoun τις is sometimes put for the relative; as in Latin qui and quis, and in English, who is both relative and interrogative. Examples, (1) Where τις retains its interrogative meaning, and still must be rendered in Latin by quis or quod. E.g. Mat 20:22
Matthew 20:22 αποκριθεις δε ο ιησους ειπεν ουκ οιδατε τι αιτεισθε δυνασθε πιειν το ποτηριον ο εγω μελλω πινειν και το βαπτισμα ο εγω βαπτιζομαι βαπτισθηναι λεγουσιν αυτω δυναμεθα
But Jesus answered and said, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?”… Learn Koine Greek
