Hebrews 1:7

Feel free to ask for help deciphering BDAG any time. Statistics: Posted by Jonathan Robie — October 21st, 2016, 9:43 am

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Thanks, you are always so helpful. Much appreciated. I am relying a lot on whats in my first year textbook, this does highlight that I would benefit from spending more time digging in BDAG, however, not understanding half of the abbreviations in BDAG does make it somewhat difficult/tedeous to trawl through. (Although thankfully I am certainly improving, I used to find BDAG impossible to navigate) Statistics: Posted by Jacob Rhoden — October 21st, 2016, 2:19 am

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Jonathan Robie wrote: I don't think translations typically use "on the one hand ... on the other hand" for μὲν .... δὲ constructions at all. Here is a search for μὲν in SBLGNT, you can easily pick instances and see how they are translated. I think it's pretty rare to translate it as "one the one hand". BDAG mentions this:

BDAG: μέν ❶ marker of correlation ⒜ introducing a concessive clause, followed by another clause with an adversative particle wrote:to be sure ... but, one the one hand ... on the other hand, though in many cases an equivalent translation will not fit this scheme; rather, the contrast is to be emphasized in the second clause, often with but.

"On the one hand...on the other" is one of those largely "translationese" renderings that is designed to show the correlation, but is often expressed idiomatically in different ways in English. Statistics: Posted by Barry Hofstetter — October 20th, 2016, 5:25 am

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I don't think translations typically use "on the one hand ... on the other hand" for μὲν .... δὲ constructions at all. Here is a search for μὲν in SBLGNT, you can easily pick instances and see how they are translated. I think it's pretty rare to translate it as "one the one hand". BDAG mentions this:

BDAG: μέν ❶ marker of correlation ⒜ introducing a concessive clause, followed by another clause with an adversative particle wrote: to be sure ... but, one the one hand ... on the other hand, though in many cases an equivalent translation will not fit this scheme; rather, the contrast is to be emphasized in the second clause, often with but.

Statistics: Posted by Jonathan Robie — October 19th, 2016, 9:28 am

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I notice that there appears to be a μὲν ... δὲ construct between verse 7 and verse 8, which really is obvious in English even if you ignore the contruct.

καὶ πρὸς μὲν τοὺς ἀγγέλους λέγει· "...." πρὸς δὲ τὸν υἱόν· "....."

My working/practice translation, translates it as:

And, on one hand, to angels he says "...." but to the son (he says) "...."

However, after checking 10 different translations, it seems to me that no translation pulls out the "on one hand" sense of the μὲν...δὲ. Is this because pulling out the "on one hand" phrase just feels a little clunky, or is there a grammatical reason to not use it? Thanks! Statistics: Posted by Jacob Rhoden — October 19th, 2016, 1:12 am

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