Or you could've gone to International Christian University for an AA in Theology and have taken the Greek there also but that was way back in the 80's and 90's..
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Syntax of 1 John 5:1 as a proof for monergism
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Greektim
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John, I think we are at an impasse. I think you have misunderstood me on several key points which makes the discussion go nowhere.
Like I'm not saying gennao means "caused" but that to be born implies a cause/effect sequence. In every case in 1 John, to have been born by God implies a cause/effect concept, like not sinning, loving, doing righteousness, and believing. The reason this happens is because to be born (physically or spiritually) is the beginning and thus the cause of all other effects thereafter. To illustrate the implied causality of the main verb, do it this way: "All who believe have been killed by Satan." Since killed implies the end of the line, then the cause/effect relationship is the opposite. Satan killed b/c of belief.
My OP was all about the fact that this same causal sequence is quite obvious in 1 Jn 2:29 & 4:7, therefore that same sequence (based on grammar, syntax, and semantics) would indicate the same in 5:1.
I also believe that every time you try to use an illustration, it fails b/c you don't allow it to match the text. You started with the punching/fighting illustration which I demonstrated actually works when it matches the text. I forget which posts that was, but it was on this thread. Then you used the bat/ball illustration, still not matching the text. It is like you don't want to make a true 1 to 1 correspondence in your illustrations.
The Black quotation, as far as I can tell, is impossible to support this passage because it talks about the complement of the participle. Substantival participles don't have complements. So it can't relate here. I wish I could buy the book. Maybe I'll check it out next time I'm near LU's library.
I've enjoyed the discussion though.
BTW... I would appreciate your insight into the textual variant thread I raised in the versions forum.
Like I'm not saying gennao means "caused" but that to be born implies a cause/effect sequence. In every case in 1 John, to have been born by God implies a cause/effect concept, like not sinning, loving, doing righteousness, and believing. The reason this happens is because to be born (physically or spiritually) is the beginning and thus the cause of all other effects thereafter. To illustrate the implied causality of the main verb, do it this way: "All who believe have been killed by Satan." Since killed implies the end of the line, then the cause/effect relationship is the opposite. Satan killed b/c of belief.
My OP was all about the fact that this same causal sequence is quite obvious in 1 Jn 2:29 & 4:7, therefore that same sequence (based on grammar, syntax, and semantics) would indicate the same in 5:1.
I also believe that every time you try to use an illustration, it fails b/c you don't allow it to match the text. You started with the punching/fighting illustration which I demonstrated actually works when it matches the text. I forget which posts that was, but it was on this thread. Then you used the bat/ball illustration, still not matching the text. It is like you don't want to make a true 1 to 1 correspondence in your illustrations.
The Black quotation, as far as I can tell, is impossible to support this passage because it talks about the complement of the participle. Substantival participles don't have complements. So it can't relate here. I wish I could buy the book. Maybe I'll check it out next time I'm near LU's library.
I've enjoyed the discussion though.
BTW... I would appreciate your insight into the textual variant thread I raised in the versions forum.
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I'm sorry you feel I've misunderstood you. Perhaps the exact place on White's recording would have helped. I never did find it.
I've enjoyed it too. We'll discuss the Greek together again sometime.
I'll check it out.
Dr White will be doing a special program Friday on this very issue as Skan. Tried to do a hatchet job on his teaching by editing out the parts that he explains it with,lol by using some other person.....lol
This will be at 11 am Friday. Radio free Geneva dealing with this topic and attempted false witness.....lol.sad but true.....
This will be at 11 am Friday. Radio free Geneva dealing with this topic and attempted false witness.....lol.sad but true.....
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Greektim
Well-Known Member
I hope Dr. White realizes who this "some other person" is. Might be good for you to know too.
Abasciano is a NT prof at Gordon-Conwell Seminary. He wrote a good article against the arguments I have been advocating. I still disagree with him, but he is a good choice for Skandeloo since he is an actual scholar. Not sure if you guys can get this article online, but if you want it, I can email you a pdf version (PM me).
Abasciano, Brian J. "Does regeneration precede faith? The Use of 1 John 5:1 as a Proof Text." The Evangelical Quarterly 84, no. 5 (October 2012): 307-322.
John, you might look into this article. He raises issues that you did not, but that is because he is arguing from verbal aspect rather than time. But he comes to the same conclusions.
Yes....Dr White respects this man but believes he was given an edited form of what he taught and is seeking to address it directly.
Last night he sent an email to Dr.Flowers Facebook page,and wherever else.
I think he will bring clarity to this issue and the sinful false witness will be exposed!.
When I get to a keyboard later I will offer those links if possible and open yours thanks.
I listened to the podcast on Skan anti cal site.....lol....so it will be nice to hear this unfold.
Hello GT,
here was what was sent last night to Skan;
ouch!!!!ThumbsupThumbsupThumbsupThumbsup
Internet Theologian
Well-Known Member
Sounds like shooting fish in a barrel. A doddle. Piece of cake. I watched White readily dismantle Leighton Flowers in a debate, who, by the way looked quite angry and frustrated. I bet he gets schooled often.
Kind of like this:
Internet Theologian
Well-Known Member
This will be on Radio Free Geneva? By the way, love the term 'internet theologians' lol!
11 am Radio Free Geneva tommorow.....Skan tried his sneaky ploy but just like on BB....he was foiled, only he will not be able to give infractions seeking to censor those who saw the error....instead a full disclosure will take place openly.
Dr . White does not back down from any open interaction that is open and above board. It would not surprise me if an attempt is made to speak directly with Dr. Abasciano.....lol
Internet Theologian
Well-Known Member
I'm looking forward to it. Those in a position of authority who teach error and use deceit need to be called out and exposed.
Thankfully....Dr. White, AL Moehler, John Macarthur, will speak out as much as they can against all such deceit. When we saw it posted on here we were correct to react against it. Maybe it came across as harsh but look how it has grown like a mold or a fungus that is being inflicted as a falsehood on that bogus site.
Internet Theologian
Well-Known Member
Others probably thought Christ harsh, Paul harsh, John as well, probably Jude. But who cares what others think when walking in truth? Thank God for men of God like the one's you mentioned, and, even for those on here who opposed that false teaching, not fearing ones position while doing it. Kind of reminds me of John the Baptizer!
I would like to read that. I'll PM you.
http://www.mbu.edu/online/courses/fall-courses/
shows Greek Grammar 1A starting Aug 30, with Greek Grammar 1B starting Oct 25
shows Greek Grammar 1A starting Aug 30, with Greek Grammar 1B starting Oct 25
Greektim
Well-Known Member
So John asked for some Grammar to back up the claim that the participle doesn't have to be contemporaneous with the verb. In truth, I wasn't reading through Wallace, but I heard Dr. White quote this section, and so I tracked it down.
So here we go. I'm curious to your thoughts on this JoJ.
I'll admit, this was quoted in a section on dependent adverbal participles, something White failed to mention. So it normally would matter here. However, since he mentions the articular and adjectival part, it may be relevant.
But I will also argue that I believe the quote by Dr. White is also about dependent adverbial participles. So if mine doesn't apply, then neither does yours.
So here we go. I'm curious to your thoughts on this JoJ.
Wallace GGBB pp. 625-6 said:
I'll admit, this was quoted in a section on dependent adverbal participles, something White failed to mention. So it normally would matter here. However, since he mentions the articular and adjectival part, it may be relevant.
But I will also argue that I believe the quote by Dr. White is also about dependent adverbial participles. So if mine doesn't apply, then neither does yours.
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First of all, let me say that in the quote from Wallace, your version has "[as in the case in 1 Jn 5:1]." I don't know if you put that in there or if White did, but Wallace did not say that, and the quote should have been clear about who did put that in there. For those who do not have this book: Wallace does not connect his point on the grammar to 1 John 5:1.
Concerning the applicability of this point to 1 John 5:1, I don't see it. In the first place, the illustration given is Eph. 2:14, which does not have a perfect tense in it, and indeed is also an otherwise completely different grammatical structure from 1 John 5:1. The telic (purpose) of the present participle is clear in Eph. 2:14 because of the hina clause it is in. (To non-Greek readers: a hina clause shows purpose.) In order to prove the view that the perfect tense in 1 John 5:1 causes the present participle (something Calvinists usually state outright with no proof), a parallel grammatical structure must be found in which the telic is plain.
What Wallace says that helps my side is, "The present participle is normally contemporaneous in time to the action of the main verb. This is especially so when it is related to a present tense main verb (often, in fact, it follows a present imperative as a participle of means). But this participle can be broadly antecedent to the time of the main verb, especially if it is articular (and thus adjectival)" (Wallace, p. 625-626).
In one example he gives, Mark 6:14, John the Baptizer (present participle) clearly existed before (antecedent) his supposed raising from the dead (aorist tense). Wallace's other example is Eph. 2:13, where again the present participle (ὄντες) is clearly antecedent to the main verb.
So, as Wallace says (and as I have quoted other grammarians), the present participle is the same in time as the main verb, not subsequent to it.
Nice try, but no cigar. Tongue First of all, look again at Wallace. He is talking about adjectival participles, not adverbial.I'll admit, this was quoted in a section on dependent adverbal participles, something White failed to mention. So it normally would matter here. However, since he mentions the articular and adjectival part, it may be relevant.
But I will also argue that I believe the quote by Dr. White is also about dependent adverbial participles. So if mine doesn't apply, then neither does yours.
Again, all along I've been referencing the present participle as substantival, the subject of the sentence, not its adjectival character. To me the substantival trumps the adjectival in 1 John 5:1 (granting that the substantival is usually referred to by grammarians as a form of the adjectival).
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Greektim
Well-Known Member
John, you've written research papers before. You can assume I have as well. When you quote somebody and use squared brackets [like these], then what is in between is not quotation. This is common knowledge.John of Japan said:
I already acknowledged that this was not as solid ground as I was hoping. I actually have asked Dr. White to respond. I was a bit more scathing to him. What Wallace does allow for is that the verb does not always have to be contemporaneous as you are insisting. If nothing else, then the grammar can allow my assertion. What cements my assertion, in my mind, is the parallel structures in 2:29 and 4:7.
I prefer Cuban cigars. And I am pretty sure I'm right here. The quotation on pp. 625-626 is under
II. Verbal Participles
A. Dependent Verbal Participles
1. Adverbial
d. Specific Nuances of the Adverbial Participle
1) Temporal
c) Amplification
2] Present Participle
So he is talking about adverbial participles. But then he mentions the articular and thus adjectival aspect in them as well in the quotation, all the while under the category and sub, sub, sub, etc. of the adverbial participle. So I'm not sure what to take from that.
I know you've been referencing the substantival participle, but I don't think Dr. Black was. But that point is moot until I get a chance to peruse that book.
I'm grading Greek tests, so I can just take a few minutes. Maybe I can post more tomorrow.
Point taken. But this is the Baptist Board, so I just thought for clarity....
This has been great practice and research for both of us. I hope Dr. White responds well. He's not beyond further Greek knowledge and understanding.I already acknowledged that this was not as solid ground as I was hoping. I actually have asked Dr. White to respond. I was a bit more scathing to him. What Wallace does allow for is that the verb does not always have to be contemporaneous as you are insisting. If nothing else, then the grammar can allow my assertion. What cements my assertion, in my mind, is the parallel structures in 2:29 and 4:7.
Good catch. I didn't notice that. But then Dr. White is even further off base, since the participle in 1 John 5:1 is adjectival, not adverbial. It even points out the difference in the Wallace quote: "...especially if it is articular (and thus adjectival)" (pp. 625-628).
It's complicated.
I'll have to get back and take another look at my quote from Black. My quote from Machen is clear, though.
As I think I have noted, since the grammar in 2:29 and 4:7 is very similar to that of 5:1, the same arguments apply. So I see no need to reiterate all of my arguments for 5:1 in connection with those verses. I'll simply say that it is fully in line with the syntax of 2:29 to say that the righteousness is a sign of being born again (not a result), and the same thing goes for "loving" in 4:7. To prove otherwise, as I've noted several times, one would have to find a meaning for gennaw of producing what the subject of the sentence is rather than simply birthing.
I took another look at my quote from Black, and it is talking about participial clauses. What we have in the substantival participles in view is phrases, not clauses, so Black's point doesn't apply.
But I'll always have Machen, one of the greatest Greek scholars ever (even though he was a Presbyterian). Here it is again:
"Here the Greek uses the present participle because the time of the action denoted by the partciple is the same as that of the action denoted by the leading verb, even though the action denoted by the leading verb here happens to be in past time" (NT Greek for Beginners, p. 109).
The examples Machen gives are not directly parallel to our passage, but I still think his statement applies. Once again I note that participles do not show time, but aspect.
But aha! How about another quote from Black, this one more direct and relevant:
"Though the tense of the participle never conveys an independent expression of time, it usually involves a temporal significance derived from the context. This is especially true of adverbial participles. Generally speaking, the present participle denotes action taking place at the same time (emphasis Black's) as the action of the main verb (contemporaneous action)" (It's Still Greek to Me, p. 124).
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