I was wondering if anyone who knows some NT Greek may be able to help please with clarifying the translation of 1 Cor 16:22 and Gal 1:6,8.

I have heard that sometimes there is confusion as to whether something should be translated as indicative or imperative. Is there confusion in the Greek of these passages?

In 1 Cor 16:22 most translations say something like “If anyone does not love the Lord - let him be cursed”.
That seems very harsh to me.
The NIV, rather than saying “let him be cursed”, says “a curse be on him” and the NLT says “that person is cursed”.

Is Paul saying that presently these people who do not love the Lord are in a bad situation (a concept I find easier to understand), or is he wishing something bad to come upon them (a concept that sounds more unkind)?

I have the same question regarding Paul’s “cursing” of those who preach a different gospel in Gal 1.
Most translations say “let him be cursed”.
The NASB however says “he is to be accursed” and the HCSB says “a curse be on him”.

There isn’t any semantic difference between “let him be cursed” and “a curse be on him” and “he is to be (ac)cursed”.

“That person is cursed” is more neutral, and might be only a statement of fact, rather than something Paul agrees with or enacts to whatever degree – but then again in the same 1 Cor, Paul hands the Stepmom-Sleeping Guy over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh so that his spirit may be saved in the Day of the Lord to come. Regardless of what “destruction of the flesh means” (whether to death or not), Paul is actively inflicting the judgment or at least agreeing with it strongly.

Anathema literally means up-place, and metaphorically means being held up as an example, by cultural context as a bad example or as an example of what happens for bad behavior. Knoch thinks it relates back to pagan human sacrifices originally as punishment! In the Greek LXX however it has a much more neutral meaning of being devoted to God, sometimes devoted for destruction where appropriate.

Anathema is itself a noun; there’s a verb form (not the verb from which the noun comes), that’s rarely used in the NT, most importantly when Peter curses himself to deny Christ in Mark 14:17 (so an anathema isn’t hopeless. The other verb usage is toward the end of Acts when some Jews put themselves under an oath to neither eat nor drink until they have killed Paul. This presumably does not work out well for them.

Most of the time the word is used as a noun, which has six occurrences in the NT (one of which is the aforementioned Acts 23 assassination conspiracy.) Aside from the examples already mentioned in Galatians 1 and 1 Cor 16, Paul could wish himself anathema from Christ if that would save his fellow Jews in Romans 9:3, and again at 1 Cor 12:3 Paul writes that no one can say “Christ is anathema” while speaking by the Spirit of God.

The noun form is always the same, so translations into English are taking the noun and turning it into a verb, in relation to whatever nearby verb of being is contextually connected to it. For 1 Cor 16:22 and Gal 1:8-9 (where Paul repeats the curse twice for slightly different reasons), that verb is {êtô}, which is the 3rd Person Singular form (providing the implied “him”, by the way, which doesn’t show up in Greek there) of the present imperative active form of “is”.

In other words, “let him be cursed” and “a curse be on him” and “he is to be (ac)cursed” are all proper translations. “That person is cursed” doesn’t translate the concept of present active command or requirement. It’s the difference between saying “let him be stopped” and “he is stopped”; the former is the correct parallel to the verb form, not the latter.

There is also one NT usage of a slightly different noun form {anathêma} to refer to votive offerings in the Temple, as Luke translates the disciples calling attention how beautiful the Temple looks in GosLuke 21:5.

Anathema is actually a noun form of the verb {anatithêmi}, which is itself a prolonged version of the verb {theô} from which {theos} comes – but it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with God. The underlying idea is to rise or more basically to place, and so by application there’s a sky/solar connection, in which the sun rises and from where generation comes (it’s also the primary word from which, more directly but much later, we get the English word “day”) and also a thematic connection (not grammatical) to {logos} by the way. The verb form with a slight modification into {theôreô} can also mean to look upon, which is probably a derivation from the idea of the sun (seeming to be) looking down from on high. You might recognize the {-tith-} part as being where we also get the word “tithe”, which goes back to the more usual LXX application of devoting or sacrificing a gift to God.

The verb {anatithêmi} shows up twice in the Gospels, both times in relation to Paul as it happens. By context each time, it means placing-up Paul’s case before someone, such as in his legal defense to Festus, or Paul submitting for examination, to the Jerusalem apostles, the gospel he received from Christ.

I should perhaps add that from early years, the Catholic Church (pre-schism, and post-schism) interpreted this idea to be the same as ex-communication, excluding someone from communion, which was only a way of acknowledging that the people so judged were already excluding themselves from common union, and so to be the same as the church discipline Jesus talks about in Matt 18 where the misbehaving member is first quietly and then publicly “exposed”, and then if he does not change his mind he is treated as a pagan or a traitor. But pagans and tax-collectors are evangelized, and the verb Christ uses for “expose” refers very explicitly to a remedial punishment intended to lead to repentance. He uses the same word with exactly that explanation against the Laodicians in RevJohn 3: He exposes those He loves when they misbehave, and He’s referring there to people He’s about to (analogically) vomit out of His mouth for being too lukewarm! – He would actually prefer they be cold, which by comparative reference would mean He would appreciate them better if they were explicitly against Him! Like, for example, pagans and traitors.

Of course things developed in the RCC (and eventually in the EOx) so that to die out of communion was to be hopelessly lost, so excommunication became much more of a threat. But that wasn’t the original context.

Thanks very much Jason for your very thorough and helpful answer.

So, if I am understanding you correctly, in 1 Cor 16:22, Paul is not just saying “he is cursed” as a statement of fact, but rather more actively saying “let him be cursed” - like most translations have. So the NLT translation “that person is cursed” is incorrect.

When he says “if anyone does not love the Lord - let him be cursed”, do you think he is referring to everyone in the world, or just to those within the church - for them to be disciplined or excommunicated?

The bottom line is that in both 1 Cor 16:22 and Gal 1:8 there is a verb in the 3rd person present active imperative which means “let him (or ‘her’ or ‘it’) be.”

Jason, can you tell me why there are two different forms of the 3rd person present active imperative of “ειμι”?
The one in 1 Cor 16:22 is “ητω” and the one in Gal 1:8 is “εστω.”

Actually, I was hoping you’d have some idea about that! I had a vague theory, but it didn’t pan out – I checked a grammatic interlinear and both forms are listed as “vm Pres vxx 3 Sg”. (I don’t understand several of the verb form abbreviations in that interlinear, including vxx in this one, or the m after the v – it isn’t masculine because sometimes the letter is ‘i’ or something else like that. Any ideas…? I feel like the initial letter possibilities after “v” for verb, dug, are something I ought to recognize… But ‘i’ sure doesn’t stand for intransitive, I think…?)

I know of a couple of other grammatic interlinears; I’m going to cross-check with them.

Craig, originally the term could apply more broadly and even positively as in the LXX (the Greek Old Testament translation). There’s probably a conceptual connection to the idea of the lake of fire being represented by the basin for washing sacrifices clean in order to present them acceptably to God; and as noted, the secondary verb form is used in a positive way once by Luke when translating the disciples’ appreciative remarks about the artistic votive offerings helping to decorate the Temple. Anyway, in most of its few NT usages it seems to apply to excommunication out of the Christian group, although Paul does also use it in the sense that no one can say Christ is anathema while speaking from the Holy Spirit.

I suppose broadly speaking, the ethically negative usage could be said to apply to anyone outside the Church; although that should be balanced by Christ’s warning to His own apostles at the end of Matt 25, that He judges people to be faithful servants even when they had no idea they were serving Him (and the many warnings, including elsewhere in Matt 25, that people who think they’re solidly ‘in’, up to and including the apostles themselves, may be solidly ‘out’!)

Argh, the other interlinears are giving no idea at all. Maybe it’s a minor dialect? I’m not sure what the scholarly spread of opinion is about whether the scribe taking dictation for Galatians is the same as for 1 Cor, though I vaguely recall hearing that there are enough differences to suppose not. {êtô} is less usual than {estô}; unfortunately, the two times it occurs are not both in Galatians 1:8-9, which would lend strength to a particular scribal quirk. On the contrary, the other time aside from 1 Cor 16 is James 5:12 – and James 1:19 features one of the normal {estô} occurences, too!

It’s hard to search for Greek terms in Robinson’s historical grammar (on the Kindle or a pdf anyway), but I may take a shot to see if he has any ideas.

The only real difference I can find is that “ἤτω” (let be) sounds to have a slightly stronger authoritative overtone in comparison to a slightly gentler rendering of “ἔστω”… but that could be my subjective reading of the texts (Gal 1:8-9 aside??). Interestingly Mt5:37 <ἔστω> and Jas 5:12 <ἤτω> say virtually the same thing, so I can only conclude these renderings are pretty much interchangeable and thus any real difference minuscule.

ἤτω…
Psa 104:31 (LXX)
1Cor 16:22
Jas 5:12

ἔστω…
Mt5:37
Mt 18:17
Lk 12:35
Acts 1:20; 2:14; 4:10; 13:38; 28:28
2Cor 12:16
Gal 1:8-9
1Tm 3:12
Jas 1:19
1Pt 3:3

Or Unical!

http://old.wargamer.com/forums/smiley/wall.gif

But seriously, good point.