Deponency in koine greek: The grammatical question and the lexicographical dilemma

Trinity Journal, Spring 2003 by Pennington, Jonathan T

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Second-year students of Koine Greek must commonly be disabused of the notion that the middle voice is equivalent to the English reflexive. Even if they have learned their Greek from a modern grammar that has avoided making this error, the perception is quite common. The reflexive rope seems the only one to grab when trying to swing across the unfamiliar chasm of the Greek middle. The problem is exacerbated by the use of ... (or something similar) as the exemplar for comparing the three Greek voices with English:1

... - active, "I wash"

... - middle, "I wash myself"

... - passive, "I am being washed"

But there is yet another disabusing that must be done regarding our understanding of the Greek middle voice. This concerns the definition and classification of what is typically called deponency. Ostensibly, these are verbs which are middle or middle/passive in form but whose meaning is active. Such is the definition given by nearly all introductory grammars.

However, this is a case where the complexity of the matter is much greater than it at first appears. Unfortunately, grammars simply repeat the old definition, relying on each other, without realizing the great inadequacy of this formulation. Some of the older grammarians such as A. T. Robertson and C. F. D. Moule were dissatisfied with the handling of deponency, but the simplistic definition has remained intact, as is seen in nearly all modern grammars. The few contemporary exceptions to this include K. L. McKay, Stanley Porter, and Daniel Wallace.2 The latter two state ... explicitly the need for more work to be done in this area.3 This essay attempts to make a small contribution to such a need.

This article will challenge the normal grammatical conception of deponency and will go on to examine the problems intrinsic to it lexicographically. I will argue that the validity of the notion of deponency is questionable in light of a closer look at the function and meaning of the middle voice in Greek. Further, I will offer some specific suggestions on how lexicons should handle middle-only forms in a consistent way. Although these two categories - grammar and lexicography - are organically related and interwoven, they will be treated separately for maximal clarity.

I. THE GRAMMATICAL QUESTION

A. The History of the Greek Voices

One of the most unexpected revelations regarding the Greek voices is that originally there was no separate passive voice. The language existed for some time with only the active and middle voices. Most grammarians are confident that the passive voice was a later development that stemmed from the middle. It eventually encroached upon the middle in form and meaning. The result of this linguistic evolution is that Modern Greek has no middle forms remaining, but only active and passive.4 In the NT period, this evolution was still very much in process. It is only in the aorist that separate passive forms had become fully established (and to a lesser extent the future passive which is based on the aorist passive).5 Meanwhile, the middle form is losing ground on its way to obsolescence. This was occurring on three fronts. First, verbs that in Classical Greek took middle form in the future were tending to adopt future active forms instead.6 Similarly, verbs that were ... typically aorist middle were increasingly occurring in the aorist passive form, yet still with a middle or active meaning.7 The two most common examples of this are ... instead of ... and ... instead of .... In both of these instances, some of the aorist middle forms are residual in the NT. Thirdly, the active forms plus a reflexive pronoun are increasingly used where Classical Greek would have used the middle.8 Understanding this development will help us get a better grasp on the Greek middle, and in turn, on Greek deponency.

B. The Meaning of the Middle

Wallace begins his discussion of the middle voice with this warning: "Defining the function of the middle voice is not an easy task because it encompasses a large and amorphous group of nuances."9 There is also another reason the middle voice is thorny. It is simply difficult for English speakers to comprehend this category of meaning because we have nothing equivalent grammatically. "English speakers can do approximately the same things with their language as the middle form does in Greek, but various syntactical means rather than a single expression are required."10 English requires the use of prepositional phrases and reflexive and other pronouns to communicate what the middle morpheme could alone. Due to this significant difference in the linguistic framework of Greek, the middle voice has often been misunderstood.

Most grammarians today are careful not to equate the middle voice with the English reflexive. It seems this was not always the case. Writing originally in 1953, Moule states, "Grammars sometimes describe the Middle as primarily reflexive. Whether or not this is true for certain periods, it is manifestly not true of N.T. usage."11 Now this view is universally accepted and rightly so.