[lit-ideas] Re: En arche en ho logos, kai ho logos en pros ton theon, kai theos en ho logos
- From: Julie Krueger <juliereneb@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 4 Jul 2009 23:04:38 -0500
Perhaps more on this later, but Jung, in his amazing piece "On Job", makes a
convincing argument for the Sophia of the Tanakh and the Logos of the
Gospels being one continuous thread of a certain typology.
Julie Krueger
On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 9:21 PM, <Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> Yes, I echo Ursula Stange that it translates 'logos'.
> I think it's then the _Greek_ concept, and something for us Christians, but
> not necessarily those who only abide by the _Old_ Testament.
> I understand the idea of 'logos' here is the Christians paying a little
> homage to the Greek tradition in philosophy.
> R. Paul should edify us about it.
>
> When I studied philosophy, or even Latin (my professor, Dissandro, has a
> book written on "From mythos to logos") the idea was that _logos_ signified
> the beginning of _philosophy_.
>
> The 'mythos' is _also_ 'word' (so be careful when you say 'wordless' as in
> Mendelsohn's 'wordless song') and so is _epos_.
>
> Thus, while Plato uses 'mythos' in his philosophical dia-LOGUES, he is
> more into 'logos' than 'mythos'.
>
> The Romans spoiled it for us in having to use 'verbum', which is _NOT_
> cognate with 'logos'. "Loquor" _is_ (cognate with 'logos').
>
> The Greek root, 'logos' also appears with the stem, 'leg-', as in legomenon
> (what is said).
>
> The Romans of a philosophical orientation preferred to translate 'logos'
> as "ratio" but I'm not sure who started this habit, since a _ratio_ in
> Latin
> was more like a reckoning or calculation, or a physical mark of a
> calculation, even.
>
> ----
>
> So by saying what he does, the apostle is saying,
>
> "In the beginning there was a Reason".
>
> When Thales first appealed to _logos_ as opposed to mythos, he was trying
> to _explain_ things (in a 'rational' way). For consider 'laurel'. Why is
> the
> laurel like this? Well, there is this myth (the first one used in opera)
> that 'laurel' (Daphne in Greek) was a maiden who was going to be raped by
> Apollo, etc. So that is a MYTHICAL explanation, but not a LOGical one.
>
> Both invoke words, but 'logos' is logos is logos.
>
> So the Apostle may be saying that there is a RATIO, a rationale behind the
> COSMOS (for that must be 'world' -- an English notion, cognate with 'were',
> man, as in werewolf. (But I double check and we don't need to assume it's
> the beginning _of the world_ -- the Greek just go, "en arche", in the
> beginning (whatever that may mean) -- in olden times (archaic -- arche)
> may be
> more cognate).
>
> And "Gott" is also the English notion.
>
> So I would think the Greek uses:
>
> 'kosmos', 'theos' and 'logos' -- and these three words were pretty
> important in Greek philosophy.
>
> So I guess it was an appeal to the Western (Graeco-Roman) sort of
> tradition, rather than to the Hebraic one per se.
>
> Arnold has written extensively on Hebraism versus Hellenism. I would think
> that the 'logos' emphasis here is a Hellenic thing.
>
> But I don't know the first thing about Hebrews and Semites, so maybe the
> idea of something like the 'logos' was common with them, too.
>
> Double checking:
>
> en: is indeed the proposition, 'in', and in Greek it follows the dative
> case, which 'arche' is.
>
> 'en' (the third word) is the imperfect of 'to be'. I don't think really the
> preterite, 'was'. Erat vs. fuit -- I should check with the Vulgata.
>
> 'ho logos' because 'logos' is masculine, and 'ho' means 'the' in Greek.
> 'kai' is of course Attic for 'and'.
> 'pros ton theon'. 'ton theon' here is accusative, so 'pros' must govern the
> accusative. I wouldn't translate it as 'with' God. In Classical Greek,
> 'with' is 'syn', as in 'tea and sympathy'.
>
> 'pros' I would keep as 'pro'. And the word was _pro_ the God. (rather than
> against him?)
>
> ---- the third clause, 'kai theos en ho logos'.
>
> seems rhetoric. "Equitive" sentences, as those using 'was' are notably
> meant to be symmetrical and reciprocal (as in today's column by O'Reilly on
> 'it
> is what it is").
>
> But the second clause ('ho logos en pros ton theon') should not necessarily
> yield "ho logos en ho theos" (the word was god). So the apostle must find
> it not otiose to emphasise that God _was_ the word.
>
> Note that while in the _second_ clause 'god' has the definite article to
> it, which I find low-class ("the God", 'ton theon'), the apostle wittily
> omits it in the third clause.
>
> One problem with 'en' (was) is noted by Mike Harnish, the philosopher of
> Arizona. He notes that when people used the past,
>
> "She ejaculated very soon" ---- (sorry for the vulgarism, but I am
> falling asleep writing this
> theological stuff).
>
> the implicature seems to be that she no longer does it.
>
> "I swam a lot -- indeed I still do"
>
> The theory of implicature is pretty new, and I hope St. John was not
> familiar with it, so I tend to think that 'en' was perhaps historical for
> him.
> Implicature: God is NO LONGER the word -- that was only in the beginning,
> hence 'en' (was).
>
> But as Michael Chase has pointed out to me, the 'en' features also in
> Aristotle's idea of 'essence' (to ti en einai'), where the 'en' is 'was',
> and
> Ross, the commentator, translates this as a non-historical past,
> "philosophical" past, I think he calls it.
>
> Etc.
> ---
>
> Cheers,
>
> J. L. Speranza
> Buenos Aires, Argentina
>
> ---- (and thanks for the other post, about the king not being a subject
> -- much appreciated).
>
> ---
> In a message dated 7/4/2009 9:23:10 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
> Ursula@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
> I think it has something to do with different translations of the Greek
> 'Logos'.
>
> Mike Geary wrote:
> "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
> was God." To me this first sentence of Scripture is the most astonishing
> and
> most puzzling that I've ever encountered. I can't make any sense of it.
> And yet I've lived with it for 65 years without reaching out for some
> elucidation. What the hell does it mean? Any suggestions? What does
> "Word"
> mean in this context?
>
> Mike Geary
> wordless
> in Memphis
>
>
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