Biblical Greek - Lesson 9

Dr. Bill Mounce
Biblical Greek
NT201-09
Adjectives
Lesson Transcript

[00:00:01] Well, good morning. In this chapter, we're going to learn adjectives, and adjectives are simply words that modify an honor pronoun. Right. Good. Bad. High. Low. Adjectives in English perform three basic functions. An adjective can function as an attribute F, which means it simply modifies another word. It gives an attribute to the word. He is a good student. Good is an attribute of adjective that is giving an attribute or telling you something about the noun it modifies, namely student. But adjectives can also function substantively. They can function as substantive. They can function as nouns, in other words. And so, for example, you can say the good are welcome. Now, good technically is an adjective, but is functioning as a noun, isn't it? But adjectives can also function as predicates. And this is when you have the subject and you have the verb normally of to be, you know, M.R. was were. And because the meaning of that word, because it's an acquired a verb, what follows it doesn't modify the subject, but it predicates something about it. It makes an assertion about it. So if you say she is good, good doesn't modify she but is telling you something about the subject. It's asserting something about it. And it just has to do with the equator verbs and that what the verb to be means. The encouraging thing about adjectives in Greek is that you already know all the forms. Now you notice that this word, it's Augustus. It means good. You notice that it occurs unlike nouns in all three genders. We'll talk about why in just a second. But the endings of all the adjectives that you're going to meet in chapter nine are all endings that you know already. The adjective in Greek functions basically the same way that it does in English.

[00:02:12] And so, for example, you can have Greek adjectives functioning as an attribute of, in other words, is going to tell you something about the noun that it modifies. Now, how would you guess? And it's a guess, but you already have a hint in some other part of speech, you know, how would you guess? A Greek speaker would establish the form of an adjective, this modifying a noun. How would you determine the case number and gender? Yeah, whatever the noun is. So that an adjective that is an attribute of adjective that is modifying another noun is going to be in the same case number and gender of the word modifies. But Greek adjectives can also function substantively. So, for example, if you had Augustus Eston. It's going to be translated. The good is something or other. Now, let's let's make a stab at this. How do you think that the Greek writer would determine the case of an adjective this functioning as if it were a noun? Right. It's function in this case. What is Augustus doing in a sentence? It's the subject and therefore it's in the nominative. Okay, so the rule is that if an adjective is functioning substantively, its case is determined by its function in the sentence. See, there's nothing for it to modify, otherwise it'd be an attribute of. How do you think they're going determine the gender number of a substantive L.A.? Context. In other words, what does it stand for? It is a stand for a single masculine or a plural feminine, or maybe a singular neuter. At this point, we're in natural gender. Yeah, well, whatever it stands for, I mean, technically, there's not an antecedent. That's grammar has to do with pronouns, but the adjective is going to stand for something, and it's going to take its gender and number from whatever it stands for.

[00:04:17] The third function for the Greek adjective is the predicate function. In other words, if you were to see octopus Augustus, you'll find out in a second why, But you would translate that the man is good. And because a pretty good adjective is always asserting something about the subject, guess what case it always is. Not much of. What gender number is a predicate adjective going to be? Whatever it stands for. What I wanted to stress, by the way I'm doing this is that there's not a whole lot new to learn here, that you're taking things you've learned from a definite article in inflection in general and saying, Well, yes, common sense. Obviously, that's the way it works. The question then becomes, how do you recognize these things when you see an adjective in a text? How do you know whether it's an attribute of a substantive or a predicate? It all depends upon whether there's an article present or not. That's the key to everything in adjectives. Is there an article with the adjective? Is there an article with the noun? Is there an article with both? If you have Agatha's arm through a pass or if you have Anthroposophy. Augustus You'll notice that in both situations the adjective Augustus is a tribute. If you can either have article. Adjective. Noun. Are you going to have article? Noun. Article. Adjective. It doesn't make any difference which way it comes. In both of those cases, you have an articular adjective and therefore you know that it's an attribute of adjective. Okay. What have you have against us? In other words, what if you have an adjective and there's nothing for it to modify? What do you have? You have a substantive level adjective. You'll see the good and you'll go start looking for the good.

[00:06:29] What you'll find out there is no what. And oh, assumption table. Now, one of the tricks on subs and table adjectives is that you can add in words if the context requires it. If you had Augustus, see how good your guessing machine is. What could you add in? Because sometimes in English you can say the good. But if it's referring to a person, you can't. So what could you say? You'd say the good. You could say the good one if the masculine was functioning generically. If it was referring to a single male, then you could say the good. You can say the good man. What would it be? If the word was referring to a good woman? Hey, I just say, in other words, what you do is you look at the gender and the number of a substantive L.A.. Recognizing that when adjectives function substantively, they follow natural gender. And you can just add in a word that fits. If it's plural, you could say the good ones or the good people or the good crowd or whatever fits the context. If you saw her answer, Augustus or Augustus Anthropocene. What's different about that from the first two examples? And there's no article with the adjective, the articles there with the noun, but there's no article with the adjective that's called the predicate position. And what you can do is supply the verb. I am in one of its forms. So that would be translated. The man is good. So if there's an article present, whether it's with the noun or the adjective or both. Translation is quite simple. The problem becomes what if there aren't any articles? In other words, there's no clue. You don't have the help of the article. There's only one way to translate this.

[00:08:31] And the answer is. Context. In other words, you simply have to look at the context of the sentence and ask yourself what makes sense. And if you have Augustus Anthropocene or Anthropocene, Augustus the order again for first year doesn't matter. There are two ways that you could translate that. But you look at the context and you say is good qualifying man, Is it is it modifying man or is good asserting something about man? And so you could translate Augustus Arthur Pass as a good man or a man is good.