LOY Excursus: The Genitive Absolute in the Synoptic Gospels

Updated: 23 October 2024^[1] 

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction 2. Survey of the Genitive Absolute in the Synoptic Gospels 3. Synoptic Comparison of the Genitive Absolute 3a. The Genitive Absolute in Matthew 3b. The Genitive Absolute in Mark 3c. The Genitive Absolute in Luke 4. Conclusions

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The genitive absolute (perhaps better called a genitive circumstantial participial clause)^[2] is a Greek grammatical construction in which a clause—often (but not always) at the beginning of a sentence—uses an anarthrous participle in the genitive case to describe an activity that was taking place in relation to the main action of the sentence. The genitive participle is often (but not always) accompanied by a genitive noun or pronoun that serves as the subject of the clause. According to the canons of Classical Greek, the subject of the genitive absolute ought not to appear in the main sentence, but this rule was not strictly observed even among classical authors, and was observed even less in Koine Greek.^[3] 

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Notes

1. For abbreviations and bibliographical references, see “Introduction to ‘The Life of Yeshua: A Suggested Reconstruction.’” ↩
2. See Phyllis Healey and Alan Healey, “Greek Circumstantial Participles: Tracking Participants with Participles in the Greek New Testament,” Occasional Papers in Translation and Textlinguistics 4.3 (1990): 177-259. ↩
3. See Jan Joosten, “Varieties of Greek in the Septuagint and the New Testament,” in The New Cambridge History of the Bible (4 vols.; ed. James Carleton Paget, Joachim Schaper et al.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013-2015), 1:22-45, esp. 27; Takamitsu Muraoka, A Syntax of Septuagint Greek (Leuven: Peeters, 2016), 414. ↩