Greeks — Footnotes

🔗Chapter 1

1:1 — This epistle is known in scholarship as Πρὸς Διόγνητον ('To Diognetus'). The UPDV includes chapters 1-10; see The Epistle to the Greeks for more information.

🔗Chapter 4

4:1 — I do not think you need to learn from me: the manuscript lacks the negative, reading 'I think you need to learn from me.' Most editors insert the negative (conjectured by Stephanus), since the author has just called these practices 'laughable and worthy of no account' and the rhetorical questions in 4:2-4 are dismissals, not explanations.

🔗Chapter 5

5:6 — throw away what is born: Greek ῥίπτω τὰ γεννώμενα (rhiptō ta gennōmena). The author deliberately uses the most violent word available — ῥίπτω (rhiptō, 'throw, hurl') — rather than the standard Greek for infant exposure, ἐκτιθέναι (ektithenai). The phrase τὰ γεννώμενα (ta gennōmena, 'what is born') reduces the child to the bare biological event of birth — the legal category of a baby not yet claimed by its father. In Roman custom (tollere liberos), a newborn was placed on the ground; only if the father lifted it up did it become a person. Until that moment it was merely 'what was born' and could be disposed of without consequence. The author's compound verb τεκνογονοῦσιν (teknogonousin, 'bear children') has the word for 'child' — τέκνον (teknon) — built into it; τὰ γεννώμενα strips that word out. One verb carries family and belonging; the other carries only biology. For a divine parallel to this imagery, see Ezekiel 16:4–6, where God finds an abandoned newborn — unclaimed, lying in its own blood — and says: 'Live.'

5:7 — sleep together: Greek κοίτην (koitēn), literally 'bed.' The same word is rendered 'promiscuity' (plural) in Romans 13:13 and 'bed' in Hebrews 13:4 ('let the bed be undefiled'). The manuscript reads κοινήν ('common') in place of κοίτην, yielding 'a common table, but not a common [table]' — which is nonsensical. The conjecture κοίτην, accepted by most modern editors, is supported by the Greek idiom pairing τραπέζῃ καὶ κοίτῃ (trapezē kai koitē, 'table and bed') attested in Herodotus. A scribe likely softened the text to avoid the sexual reference. Early Christians were accused of sexual promiscuity at their communal meals (see Athenagoras, A Plea for the Christians 3; Tertullian, Apology 7). The author's response is pointed: they eat together, but do not sleep together.

🔗Chapter 7

7:2 — Creator of all: Greek παντοκτίστης (pantoktistēs), an apparently coined word not otherwise found in the searched Greek corpora until Andrew of Crete in the 8th century, who applies it to God as ὁ Παντόκτιστος ('the All-Creator'). It is absent from Liddell-Scott-Jones, and BDAG and Lampe cite it from this verse alone. The author pairs it with παντοκράτωρ (pantokratōr, 'Almighty') for the assonance — pantokratōr kai pantoktistēs — apparently forming it on the model of the Septuagint phrase 'the Creator of all' (ὁ πάντων κτίστης, 2 Maccabees 1:24; Sirach 24:8); so Meecham.

7:2 — word: Greek λόγος (logos). This is not capitalized because the UPDV reserves the title 'Speech' for the Johannine corpus (John 1:1, 1 John 1:1, Revelation 19:13) where λόγος functions as a recognized Christological title. The author of Greeks uses λόγος elsewhere in the original text (chapters 1-10) in its ordinary sense — at 2:1 of his own 'new teaching' and at 8:2-3 of philosophers' 'words and claims' — and nowhere else as a title for the Son. When he names the Son he uses παῖς ('Child,' 8:9, 8:11, 9:1), υἱός ('Son,' 9:2, 9:4), and μονογενής ('only-begotten,' 10:2); in this very verse the Son is named as 'the craftsman and builder of all things' (τεχνίτης καὶ δημιουργός) whom God sends, distinct from the word God implants in hearts. See also Meecham, The Epistle to Diognetus (1949), who prefers the rendering 'teaching'; and Lienhard, 'The Christology of the Epistle to Diognetus' (1970), who treats λόγος here as a 'doubtful title' and finds the Logos-Christology of Diognetus 'almost untenable.'

7:2 — craftsman and builder of all things: Greek τὸν τεχνίτην καὶ δημιουργὸν τῶν ὅλων (ton technitēn kai dēmiourgon tōn holōn). The same Greek pair τεχνίτης καὶ δημιουργός appears in Hebrews 11:10, where it is applied to God the Father (the only New Testament use of δημιουργός, the Platonic word for the world-fashioning maker). Here the pair is applied to the Son — the one God sends — among the earliest christological uses of the term. See note at Hebrews 11:10.

7:4 — as to men: some editors insert the Greek word for 'man' before 'to men,' yielding 'as man, to men.' This edition follows the manuscript reading without the insertion, on the principle that the harder reading is more likely original: an explicit statement of the incarnation would be extraordinary in a document that nowhere else mentions this doctrine. See Lienhard (1970); Marrou.

7:6 — There is a lacuna (gap in the text) after this verse. An unknown amount of text has been lost between 7:6 and 7:7.

🔗Chapter 8

8:9 — Child: Greek παῖς (pais). The UPDV renders παῖς as 'Child' (not 'Son') throughout, reserving 'Son' for the Greek υἱός (huios). The author of Greeks deliberately alternates between παῖς (8:9, 8:11, 9:1) and υἱός (9:2, 9:4, 10:2). See Lienhard (1970): 'Christ as παῖς is the instrument of God in the plan of salvation; as υἱός he is sent and acts.'

🔗Chapter 9

9:1 — Having then already arranged all things within himself along with his Child: this opening clause depends on scholarly conjectures by Lachmann, since the manuscript is corrupt at this point. Most modern editions accept this reconstruction.

9:2 — Son: Greek υἱός (huios). This is the first use of υἱός ('Son') in the epistle, following three uses of παῖς ('Child') in 8:9, 8:11, and 9:1. See note at 8:9.

🔗Chapter 10

10:1 — Once you also desire this faith, then the knowledge of the Father will be received by you: most modern editors emend this verse, diagnosing a broken sentence. Holmes replaces λάβῃς (labēs, 'receive') with κατάλαβε (katalabe, 'grasp') — a different verb entirely. The UPDV follows the manuscript reading, which is grammatical as it stands once the Semitic conditional syntax is recognized (Blass-Debrunner-Funk §442.7). See The Epistle to the Greeks for the full textual discussion.

10:2 — kingdom in heaven: this is not equivalent to Matthew's 'kingdom of heaven' (Greek: τῶν οὐρανῶν / tōn ouranōn, genitive). Here the author uses a locative construction (ἐν / en with the dative), giving the phrase a spatial meaning: the kingdom located in heaven. See Lienhard (1970).

10:6 — becomes as a god: the Greek reads 'becomes a god' — θεὸς γίνεται (theos ginetai) — without the word 'as.' The qualifying 'as' is a deliberate addition in this translation.

10:7 — governs: Greek πολιτεύεται (politeuetai). This word has three distinct senses in the UPDV: (1) 'citizenship' (Philippians 3:20, Greeks 5:9), (2) 'governs' when the subject is God (here), and (3) 'live as citizens' (Philippians 1:27). See Bitner, review of Jefford (2014).

10:8 — The epistle ends here. Chapters 11-12, which follow in the manuscript, are widely regarded as a later addition by a different author based on differences in style, vocabulary, and theological perspective. See The Epistle to the Greeks for the evidence.