How about in Greek? that is the point of the difference!
How about in Greek? that is the point of the difference!
First off, preliminaries: It is good to meet you, i'm new here, just a month.
i am happy that you called me on this one, because as i look at my original post, i did not state my case completely.
As per the Greek, i'll do an exegesis here. i am not trying to patronise you or anyone else, i am just being simple for the benefit of Lurkers. i have no idea what your Greek language skills are...i read and write it fluently. Here is the text of Ephesians 2:8:
A word for word translation of this is as follows:
The word seswsmenoi is a perfect passive participle, nominative plural masculine first person. As you may realise, the participle is a verbal adjective, its "time" is relative to the main verb, este which is the present indicative active, second person plural of the verb eimi meaning "I am". This means that the "time" of the Participle, is before the time of the main verb, and the effects remaining until the present time. The participle is passive which means the action is being done on the subject. Being an ajective as well as a verb, the participle being in the nominative case plural, modifies the subject, ye. The subject is not explicitly stated, being given in the ending of the main verb. This is a common structure in the New Testament. So far, we have "Ye are having been saved"
As i stated in my original post to you, the pronoun touto would not modify a verb. But the participle is a verbal ajective, but still, it modifies the subject, Ye. Since the pronoun touto is neuter singular, it cannot modify a masculine plural subject. i would assume that you know what the other words mean, so i will reconstruct the verse so far:
Now we reach the crux of the argument. What does touto reference? Where i misstated before is that there are more than two options. At this point, i will defer to the scholars:
This is the most debated text in terms of the antecedent of the demonstrative pronoun, touto. The standard interpretations include (1) "grace" as antecedent, (2)"faith as antecedent, (3) the concept of a grace-by-faith salvation as antecedent, and (4) kai touto having an adverbial force with no antecedent ("and especially").
The first and second options suffer from the fact that touto is neuter, while cariti and pistewV are feminine. Some have argued that the gender shift causes no problem because (a) there are other examples in Greek literature in which a neuter demonstrative refers back to a noun of a different gender, and (b) the touto has been attracted to the gender of dwron, the predicate nominative. These two arguments need to be examined together.
While it is true that on rare occasions there is a gender shift between antecedent and pronoun, the pronoun is almost always caught between two nouns of different gender. One is the antecedent; the other is the predicate nom. In Acts 8:10, for example (outoV estin h dunamiV tou qeou), the pronoun is masculine because its antecedent is masculine, even though the predicate nom. is feminine. In Matt 13:38 inverse attraction takes place (the pronominal subject is attracted to the gender of the predicate nom.): to de kalon sperma, outoi eisin oi uioi thV basileiaV ("The good seed, these are the sons of the kingdom"). The construction in Eph 2:8, however, is not parallel because dwron is not the predicate nom. of touto, but of the implied "it" in the following clause. On a gremmatical level, then, it is doubtful that either "faith" or "grace" is the antecedent of touto.
More plausible is the thrid view, viz., that touto refers to the concept of a grace-by-faith salvation. As we have seen, touto regularly takes a conceptual antecedent. Whether faith is seen as a gift here or anywhere else in the NT is not addressed by this.
A fourth view is that kai touto is adverbial, though this view has suprisingly made little impact on the exegetical literature. If adverbial, kai touto is intensive, meaning "and at that, and especially," without having any antecedent. It focuses on the verb rather than on any noun. In 3 John 5 we see this usage: piston poieV o ean ergash eiV touV adelfouV kai touto xenouV ("you do a faithful [deed] whenever you render service for the brothers, and especially [when you do it] for strangers"). If this is the force in Eph 2:8, the text means "for by grace you are saved through faith and [you are saved] especially not by your own doing; it is the gift of God.
The issues here are complex and cannot be solved by grammar alone. Nevertheless, syntactical considerations do tend toward one of the latter two views.
So, do i disagree with Wallace?
Yes
Wallace's argument is based on syntax. On other terms, the arguments carry less weight. For example, words such as "grace", "gift" are lexigraphically nuanced (Wallace's term actually). That is to say, that by virtue of their definition they carry an understanding that nominates or rejects them for anticedents. You already know that cariV, grace, is by definition "not of ourselves". The only term that exists that is possibly of man is pistiV, faith. Secondly, the entire context of Chapter 2 of Ephesians mitigates against Wallace's interpretation of verse 8.
None the less, i am prepared for Wallace to be correct, and i to be wrong. The point is if i am wrong, and Wallace is right, it still does not disprove God's active, unique work in drawing, regenerating, justifying, and reconcilling sinful man to himself, without human "cooperation"
Please forgive the length of this post, i felt it necessary for clarity, and it was a real pain to code all of this. Again, i'm happy to meet you, and look forward to your participation in this and future discussions...Give my best to Johnny and Haji :^} btw, i know i can't spell ajective...or is that correct?